If you're into incest, sudden violence, long pauses, awkward silences, full frontal (male and female) and hyper-stylized slow movies, Dogtooth is for you!
It's shot so beautifully and each scene is a like an incredible family photograph or a piece of really contemporary portraiture. The colours are bright, poppy and real. The cropping of heads and establishing shots is strangely joyful and completely bizarre.
But oh the plot, characters and writing. It's definitely a slow burner and if you're a fan of something like Lost in Translation or Lars Von Trier, then Dogtooth will get your juices flowing. Not as slow paced as Elephant but there is definitely more emphasis on the silences than the dialogue.
I'll be honest, it freaked me out and I'm slightly too disturbed to go to bed now.
It's amazing the president of Greece is hailing it as a triumph for all of Greece considering it has a ton of inappropriate sex, implications of molestation, lots of penises, oral sex and blood in it. It's not a film I'd expect a political leader to champion. It's also not a film I'd expect the Academy to nominate considering it's quite "arty" in its execution.
However, I wasn't bored that's for sure.
Two scenes forced me to look away:
1. The cat.
2. The free-weight and mirror.
That's all I need to say.
The Town
Ben Affleck's sophomore directorial piece following on from Gone Baby Gone. It continues the current craze of portraying the glitz and glam of Bwoston's Southie projects.
It's essentially a bank heist caper with a tacked-on love story. Affleck does possess directing ability in spurts. However, much like his debut, the overall piece is imbalanced by sloppy and trite execution. The final third is especially laborious and with an ending that will conjure up memories of a particular Frank Darabont film.
It's not a bad film and worth the time. It'll fill a void during an evening when you don't want to expend much mental energy.
The highs:
Jeremy Renner. The man shows his range with a sinister performance. The film would have benefitted with more of his presence. He's definitely one of my favourite actors around.
Pete Postlethwaite has a small part as a local hard-nut. He also has the best scene and shows what a great actor he was.
Rebecca Hall does her best in a tough role. I never really felt the connection between her and Affleck. Her post-hostage syndrome wasn't explored nearly enough.
The bad:
Jon Hamm is atrocious. He's so wooden and devoid of any being. He's there to bark out lines. The power struggle between him and Affleck's crew is so important to the flow of the plot, yet, it's such a misfired performance. Affleck easily bests him in an interrogation scene.
The aforementioned third act.
