This isn’t a great film. The dialogue is stilted, the tone of certain scenes feels forced (particularly in the first half hour), many of the performances are excrutiatingly one-dimensional, and the film is visually flat (lacking the strong compositions and use of shadow and light in Spider and Crash, for example). What exactly did I expect from another graphic novel adaptation? But as a particular kind of American allegory, A History of Violence makes for an extremely potent piece of cinema (and there are scenes and moments that are just about as good as it gets). I can see why this was such a hit at Cannes. As I was watching, however, I wondered what David Lynch could have done with this material, and I guess that’s not such a great endorsement of Cronenberg’s work.
Day: September 30, 2005
The Upside of Anger
Another one of Joan Allen’s flurry of good and overlooked films this year. This is more melodramatic than I am usually willing to sit through, but it’s well done. Nothing “stupid” happens in the plot, which I appreciate on one hand. However, I wonder how realistic it is that a mother and four daughters get abandoned by the father and none of them strike out at Kevin Costner, or do anything less than act like a grown-up. The mother is the least stable of the bunch, and that seems unlikely, though certainly possible; and even she deals with the obstacles thrown into her life in a mostly grown-up way (She does drink a lot, but so do I. Who am I to cast stones?) Continue reading The Upside of Anger