This was a mystery screening and they have generally being good but there is always the possibility of it disappointing and what made that more likely is that it followed Resident Evil. The set up of the film is that Ethan Hawke plays Sam who is arrested for punching police officers and he is sent to do manual labour with the camp run by Russell Crowe's Clancy. He tells Sam that he can get his sentence reduced to be able to get his daughter back if he and three other men take gold across hazardous terrain for a friend of his.
Having watched this less than 24 hours after watching Brad Pitt and a dog go through rough terrain I thought I would be tired of what was happening but credit to Padraic McKinley for keeping things going and also making good use of the woods and scenery. It's not as easy as most would think to keep that sort of thing interesting so credit to McKinley and cinematographer Matteo Cocco for pulling it off.
I did feel like the introduction of Anna (played very well by Julia Jones) was because they were worried about having an entirely male line up. I say this cause Anna doesn't really do anything and only gets something dramatic to do when she is about to be attacked by the big guy (whose name I can't remember). I think she was better than the character allowed her to be.
The last act of the film is what makes the film as good as it is cause the journey was easy enough to pull off but making sure it ends in a satisfactory way is harder to achieve and have Sam not get killed by Taggert, get to take a share of the gold, to get one over Clancy and get his daughter back means that the film ends in a satisfactory way that makes you feel good. When Sam and Penny literally drive off into the sunset I felt like the whole film worked perfectly and you end up leaving the cinema happy with what you have seen.
I enjoyed this film very much. I saw the trailer before another film and thought that it looked interesting although there was a chance that I would have waited until it came onto streaming and I am glad that I didn't wait because it was very good from start to finish. I thought that it was a very good story with great performances especially from Ethan Hawke although Russell Crowe deserves some praise. I suspect it will struggle to get seen at the cinema but if you do come across it on streaming that its a good way to spend an hour and a half. It was nice to have a mystery screening where no one walked out which did surprise me.
No comments:
Post a Comment