I loved Festen. But asked why, it is impossible to explain. There are no sympathetic characters there, only troubled ones. So any movie that critics are desperate to compare to it are in trouble.
PNG has few immediately likable characters in it. At first sight. The counter point is that this makes them all the more human. Critical reviewers might find that fact of life bland, but the non-binary nature of humanity is exactly what this movie demonstrates. No one is as they seem, at first sight. Because no one is 1-dimensional. This is not spectacular as an observation, but the movie does well in developing this line of thought, without becoming too cliche.
Better movies exist, but to dismiss this one as a failure is just lazy, IMHO. There might be no clear winners in terms of the plot, but anyone who dismisses this as negative is clearly more destined to adore the superhero genre. This is about actual people, including all of their imperfections without making an enormous deal of it. Deal with that.
PNG has few immediately likable characters in it. At first sight. The counter point is that this makes them all the more human. Critical reviewers might find that fact of life bland, but the non-binary nature of humanity is exactly what this movie demonstrates. No one is as they seem, at first sight. Because no one is 1-dimensional. This is not spectacular as an observation, but the movie does well in developing this line of thought, without becoming too cliche.
Better movies exist, but to dismiss this one as a failure is just lazy, IMHO. There might be no clear winners in terms of the plot, but anyone who dismisses this as negative is clearly more destined to adore the superhero genre. This is about actual people, including all of their imperfections without making an enormous deal of it. Deal with that.