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robert-broerse
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The Broken Circle Breakdown (2012)
Felix van Groenigen's Belgium Love Letter to Bluegrass
While De Helaasheid de Dingen (The Misfortunates) was more a coming of age story, one focused on loss, adolescence and redemption, Felix van Groeningen's follow-up has a deeper and more tragic message.
In the film we follow in non-linear fashion the lives of Didier and Elise as they meet, fall in love, perform together, have a baby and grapple with their daughter's cancer. Didier is in love with America and American bluegrass and he speaks tenderly of the music. Once a punk rocker he now plays the banjo in a bluegrass band. Elise is a tattoo-artist, free-spirited in her own way, and by mid-way through the film we see as her more religious than her husband. She becomes a member of Didier's band.
What I like best about this film is the seamless way in which the past and present are woven together. Though the film jumps back and forth, the viewer is never lost. Felix van Groeningen has sculpted a movie so intuitively that the audience feels as if they are travelling back and forth, experiencing the highs with the lows and knowing they are part and parcel of life and love. How a moment in the present woefully contrasts a tender episode in the distant past belong to this film's masterful sweep and handling of events.
Moreover, both Johann Heldenbergh (also of The Misfortunates) and Veerle Baetens (Loft) are intoxicating in their performances. Every time I found the film harder to watch, I couldn't stop watching them. We feel grounded in their lives, their passion for each other despite the eventual pain of burying their daughter. We also feel the relationship splintering and understand how Didier and Elise react. While Elise consoles herself with religion, Didier directs his anger at the country of America.
Also, having grown up in a household of Emmylou Harris, Johnny Cash, Linda Ronstadt and classic country, I loved the music. The performances invoke joy and feet-stomping happiness that too is intoxicating.
I suppose my only criticism and it is both major and minor is that the film seems to lose itself in the maudlin after the midway point. I kept comparing the film to The Misfortunates in its ability to balance the tragic with the light-hearted. I also found myself thinking of the Irish film, Once by writer/director John Carney which also featured a musician couple. Though the latter film dealt more with love frustrated by time and circumstance and not tragedy, I felt it was resolved with a realist touch. It is difficult to both love a movie and see its flaws and herein lies my main qualm with The Broken Circle Breakdown: it gets caught up in the pain and loses the balance and ultimately the realism. The audience has already succumbed to the death of Didier and Elise's charismatic daughter (played by newcomer Nell Cattrysse)and towards the end must then accept Elise's overdose.
I can even pinpoint the scene where the film roughly goes off course. Following a performance of 'If I needed You', Didier rants to his audience about God and religion and the banality of belief, especially when it stands in the way of stem-cell research. It is in this moment he loses Elise (having at this point re-christened herself Alabama). I know the director based his film on the play written by his lead and Miekke Dobbels but it's at this point where nuance and subtlety is suddenly exchanged for a hammer blow and what was once hinted at and discussed with metaphor and poetry becomes polemic. Knowing musicians and performers, Didier's anti-religious outburst felt out of character and explicit. It is recognizable that grief can be untamed, that angry and fear make up a large part of the pain but that's what art is for. Music, I would argue is the channel for suffering to be healed and Didier's opportunity to broadcast himself to an audience felt out of touch and forced. This soap box moment took me out of the film and the fact that his band members didn't try to stop him or at least calm him on stage proved also unrealistic. And that the diatribe was used to blatantly inspire Elise/Alabama's suicide attempt made it seem all the more ridiculous and immature.
Maybe one has to be true to the source material (both the original play and the tragic nature of bluegrass songs) but the maudlin sours the film's ending. Which is a little unfair for an audience already swept along by a troubled and bittersweet current of grief and love. Instead of providing mature (though at times immature), three-dimensional characters with a suitable conclusion, the movie devolves into soap opera theatrics. Humor is lost along with hope which the film carried so well.
This film is excellent (and flawed) and was nominated for an academy award for a reason but also didn't win, perhaps because of the movie's bitter, hopeless and cheap resolve.
In a World... (2013)
In Any Other World This Would Have Been a Basic Film
...But in Hollywood, and amongst critics, this movie has garnered rave reviews.
I suppose I can see the reason why. Like with Saving Mr.Banks, I've noticed if a movie shines a light on Hollywood and the precarious nature of film making, then said flick gets wondrous reviews. It doesn't matter if the movie is trite, banal or underwhelming (i.e. the above-mentioned Mickey Mouse-pat-on-the-back-production), it's about Hollywood. Pay attention....Hollywood. And most critics don't have the nerve or mighty ink to be honest. I'm sure a lot of them are paid off. It would make sense.
Especially with In A World. When I saw the film trailer, I was intrigued, hoping for a quirky comedy with some social criticism and heartfelt dialogue about a subject most of us don't even think about - i.e. voice overs for trailers and the glaring lack of female talent.
Its always sad when the trailer is more interesting than the film. While the film was pleasant it didn't hit the notes I was expecting and maybe I can blame the trailer but still, what can I say about the befuddling dialogue and stilted story line. On the one hand we have the heroine, Carol, a voice over actor and a hapless gal whose characterization seems to depend on her sleeping habits. Every time she is shown waking up, it looks like she went to bed in the middle of a tornado: clothes everywhere, her body draped in both blankets and last night's attire. I understand the writer wants to show her slovenly sleeping habits in order to establish she has yet to get her life together and that she wears funky, faded and frumpier clothes to broadcast she isn't a girlie girl. Fine. But it being so blatant, I couldn't stop noticing as if I was being hit over the head.
Of course cue the middle-aged sister (Dani) with her dependable husband (Gary, played by Rob Cordry). She's lost her wedding ring and flirts at work and of course, we know where this is leading. All it takes is the tape recorder Carol uses to record accents, a sexy Irishman and we have a subplot on autopilot. We know where the tape recorder is going to end up. The audience could sleepwalk through such scenarios. Of course, Carol being somewhat involved, stays with sister and they work out all the quirks and kinks of the sister's life (the tape recorder of course plays a part) just in time for the third act in which the husband drags the two sisters to an award's show where their father is being honoured.
The competitive relationship between the father and daughter I could believe. They're both in the voice over business, the father is afraid of being of forgotten and the new talent replacing him. I get it but that Lake Bell's character didn't know who Gustav was, another voice over actor, I couldn't quite swallow. Even Louis, the studio technician secretly crushing on Carol mentions how small the industry is. Wouldn't Carol have encountered Gustav considering the latter and her father are friends? Both men are trying to replace the Don, i.e. the late Don LaFontaine who made the line 'In a world' famous if not essential to film trailers. Wouldn't Carol at least have heard of Gustav when she was living in her dad's house at the beginning of the film, waking up in her befuddled state after a clothes hurricane.
Such a glaring plot hole but forgiven apparently in a comedy many critics have deemed 'clever' and 'tender' and 'wise'. Blah... I actually found myself questioning my own taste but then here, maybe it's another instance of the emperor without clothes. Though I wanted to stop the movie and just read about it on Wikipedia, I kept it going. And really, there were no surprises, no chemistry or genuine camaraderie between the characters, or truly deep social commentary or true satire - nothing here but a connect the dots kind of 'indie' comedy.
Actually, I should say something positive and hopefully avoid being deemed a 'hater' (our Kindergarten culture's way of labelling some people who might not like the same things as others and yes some people purely 'hate' but don't have an argument to back them up) - Alexandra Holden. She played Jamie, the father's wife and though she could have been any other ditsy, unlikeable blonde, she managed to bring fresh air to the film. Her Ohio accent was right on and she delivered her lines heartfelt. She was the best and most memorable part of the movie. If anything that was the great surprise. And the ending, wherein Carol starts up a class to teach girls who are professionals to talk mature. That would make a great movie, I thought. Why couldn't we have watched that film and instead of sitting through the generic and cliché-ridden script? And on a final note: I don't think I would have written this review had this movie received such rave reviews. If you look up this movie on Rotten Tomatoes, it's 92 percent. Little Miss Sunshine, 91. I shake my head. I think I'm going to have to trust IMDb a lot more than usual.
Odd Thomas (2013)
Seer With a Mission To Save Lives and Pscyhes
As this film's climax winded down, I couldn't help but compare the film to Rambo II. Some might say this is a strange comparison. But consider when Rambo II was released in the early 1980s. This was a time when America was still tender a decade on about the Vietnam War. Nixon was long gone; Reagan was President. The war had ended in 1975 but here was Rambo, the orphan of that war. Though the first film was excellent and showed the plight of veterans, the second film mocked general intelligence and in the minds of many, Rambo's machine gun and endless body count helped American audiences believe they won the war. It was cathartic entertainment at best and perhaps done for a reason.
This film is only faintly 'cathartic' but like Rambo provides that uneasy balm; and yet I couldn't help feel the film seemed to take such a timely subject as psychopaths and their need to hurt crowds of people and make it popcorn fare.
(Before I go any further, I should mention I am in no way familiar with the novels so I cannot comment on the adaptation - that is best left to fans of Dean Koontz.) Yes, this is an 'entertaining' film and was made for Friday night purposes. Odd Thomas is a quirky character and Anton Yelchin is a great actor, the young everyman and is perfectly suited for the role. We follow him nearly 100% of the time. He narrates portions of the story but for the most part, this film is fairly easy to follow. Odd introduces us to his world, tells us of his special gifts and within the first five minutes we are shown in a cartoon-like, Hardy Boys manner how he chases down and nabs a killer. Nothing too esoteric here. The supernatural fused with a bit of action.
We are then introduced to his detective buddy (Defoe) and of course, we learn Odd isn't a cop, more or less a superhero who solves crimes when he's not working as a short order cook. His girlfriend Stormy (Timlin) is equally adorable and well-suited girlfriend though most of the film she straddles the world between eye-candy for male audiences and sounding boards for plot developments. (And I have to mention this... Mr. Stephen Sommer, you have directed this movie and been sadly consistent in your ability to diminish your leading actress by making her wear the skimpiest of outfits. I am a heterosexual male but I found your wardrobe choices far too distracting and moreover, demeaning. Sincerely... me).
To get to the nitty gritty, Odd knows something is big because he's sees the presence of these other worldly creatures, bodachs forming around a low-life patron in the diner. He follows this man and begins to unravel clues that something wicked is coming to town. He's also had dreams and so have others.
What we eventually discover (ahem...SPOILER) is that a group of devil worshippers is going to attack the local mall with machine guns and blow it up with some nefarious explosives.
Again, this is popcorn fare but getting back to Rambo II and the comparison. When we think about American society, every since Columbine, there have been several deadly attacks on public property, whether schools, malls or campuses. Here we have Odd Thomas, just like Rambo, on a mission but unlike Rambo, Odd isn't here to kill (though he does take out a few baddies along the way but not with an excessive stream of bullets, a glittering puddle of shells on the ground beside him) but he does save the day. And the psyche of his country.
There are two levels of fantasy in this movie. The first being fantasy of the story, a man being able to see the dead and then pick up clues concerning the evil aggressors. He is the everyman but gifted, a Clark Kent meeting Cole Sear of The Sixth Sense (the ending to 'Odd Thomas' was notably (un)inspired by the superior, latter film). It is an adventure, a hero's tale. The second fantasy is his intention for the fictional world and ours, namely to stop the devastation from even happening.
We cannot watch this film now without the context of the last fifteen years. For me, this film is insulting. And the more I think of it, the less likely I will be able to recommend it. Year after year many people south of the border endure trauma at the hands of a madman or madmen and instead of coming to an intelligent solution on how to stem violence, films like this are made for the interim, that is until the next tragedy. Movies try to make us believe it will all go away. This film is just a terrible band-aid. We want so badly for a Odd Thomas to exist, to put our faith in him and who can blame us. How can you put your trust in governments that raise money for war? Anton to the rescue and in the unlikely world where he exists, endings are wrapped up with new set-ups in the wings.
Perhaps I am reading too deeply into this movie but I think it is dangerous to enjoy a film with such a devious intention: i.e. to make us feel we haven't already been wounded by the world outside. When audiences stepped out of theatres with memories of Rambo killing 'Charlie',they experienced a thrill of victory. Odd Thomas, I'm certain was made with the same intention.
Rectify (2013)
Not for me...
I value great television and truly believe we are living in an unparallelled golden age of intelligent t.v. HBO, AMC, FX, PBS, BBC and Showcase have all contributed to this renaissance in the medium. From Six Feet Under to Mad Men to Downton Abbey and Justified, modern audiences have been truly gifted with great things to discuss at our dinner tables, at the office or around the back deck or porch. Perhaps it is a reaction to the gluttonous and inane presence of reality television that has helped sparked this talent for great script writing or perhaps it was inevitable. Who knows.
As for Rectify, I don't quite feel the same burst of enthusiasm other newly born fans are feeling. The first episode, I was quite ardent about, seeing the potential for something groundbreaking and immediately sensed there was something to be honestly said about showcasing the life of a recently released man from death row. I loved the potential and eagerly watched more.
And yet I feel nothing remarkable came from it. For one, despite Daniel's remarkable story he is really an unremarkable character. Granted, we feel for his situation and yet by the third episode, we, audience (or maybe just me) have grown tired of his re-acclamation with the world. Great writing, I have learned establishes a fact and then moves on and explores other facets and aspects. In this instance, Daniel is constantly being shown to be a quirky character and his release from prison constantly being hammered at. This, I feel is a result of weak writing. I can only take so much of one man's curious antics and idiosyncratic behaviour before my patience is being worn. And the decision to make him laconic in his delivery only adds to the already-agonizing pace. Perhaps this be would forgivable in an indie film but as far as I can tell, great shows have great leads. Daniel is definitely different, complex and plausibly so but for the sake of story-telling, perhaps not the best choice to make him so passive.
As for the others, the cast is under-valued and under-developed and there are quite a few unbelievable moments (which I won't get into seeing I am limited to under a 1000 words).
Again, this is not for me and I simply fore warn others. I notice a trend in online forums wherein someone who is critical of something and approaches the criticism with intelligence is still called a 'hater'. Someone might love Daniel and his family but in the main, I don't find aspects believable or even intriguing. I'm not into vampire shows and anything with excessive explosion; moreover, I feel compassion for anyone who has gone through what Daniel has. For me I wish the story and the pacing was a bit more fleshed out and scenes given a greater complexity (another critique: I can only take so much of the musical score which shoulders a great deal of the drama. Music is there to enhance and compliment and in no way should it take the place of writing and acting). I only hope any other IMDb viewer will be content that this is my opinion and not feel I am lashing out. I am adding to the conversation and how can there be dialogue without some disagreement?
Overall, I would say Rectify is better than what comes out of the main networks (ABC, NBC, CBS) but not enough to rank it with the above-mentioned dramas.
A Serious Man (2009)
A Torture Chamber for Losing Time
The only thing fairly remarkable or remotely intriguing about this film is the opening wherein a Yiddish-speaking Jew of the 19th century invites (accidentally) a dybbuk (evil spirit in the shape of a man) into his family home. The ominous turn of events and the wife's sensible solution to the situation is comical and you would think the film would build on such an interesting prologue.
Alas, like reading the Book of Job without the good parts (namely the philosophical arguments and the poetry, let alone a resolution), A Serious Man feels like an exercise in viewing torture. (What is it about 2009? The Road and A Serious Man both belong in the category of 'agonizing to watch...).
Maybe the brilliance of this film lies in that you think at any minute this honest, good, hard-working Jewish man will crack and finally take on the world that is besetting him as opposed to questioning G-d. But for much of the film, our lead character, Larry Gopnik, a professor, husband, father of two, brother of socially-inept Adam, there is little here that happens, let alone satisfies a viewing audience.
It has been awhile before I watched a film wherein I continually battled with myself over whether I should continue or simply walk away. I wanted to walk away...
What made this film the most unbearable is how each periphery character rarely ever showed their humanity - Larry's Son and Daughter are simply cretins, the former a typical high school student with bully problems and marijuana indulgence (also he orders records of the month and leaves the bill for his father) while his daughter's only needs in life seem to be her hair and going out. There is no dimension to either of them while their mother, Larry's wife is a loveless shrew that remarkably makes Larry pay for his rival's funeral, an arrogant friend of the family named Sy. Throughout the first half of the film, Sy and Larry's wife are in love, working on Larry to get a kosher divorce.
After awhile, I lost sympathy for the lead, not because of his wife and family, but because he had wandered into a cinematic world lacking humanity, let alone real people. The Coens have not crafted a movie, let alone a film but an alternate universe, a torture chamber of bland direction and characterization. It has been awhile since I watched a film where I felt I despised so many characters. Ideally, supporting characters are there to create relationships, to reveal the complexity of human life. It seems everyone here is just another means to stab the lead and bludgeon him with their inane presence. Even the rabbi who refuses to talk to him feels less like a person as opposed to a forced story development.
If you were the kid in school who didn't torture earth worms or pull butterfly wings off Monarchs, then you might not like this debacle, another pseudo-film from the Coen Brothers.
Up in the Air (2009)
Blah and then some...
On the surface, an easy going film with an almost message, semi-memorable characters and a bit of believability. George Clooney's 'Ryan' goes around the country firing people for corporations that don't have the respect or humanity to do it themselves.
There is a love interest here and there is the moderately keen, Miss Keener ready to revolutionize the world of firing tagging along with charming Ryan. But where the film could have said something about human relationships, about humanity, about the real Zeitgeist of our incredibly cut throat Western world with its reliance on child labour designer clothing, Made in China products and our pathetic reliance on technology to improve our lives, it jumps into a banal story about the human heart and learning to let go of control. Once again, another film about a man afraid of the Commitment Monster...
Blah... trite and too basic to be tender, the director had a potential gold mine here but mined the blasé and the overused. A film with such an intriguing idea skips around the Truth and the Heart, giving us a leading man burnt by a woman and living on in a world far too much like his broken heart. Just blah.
And again... what a great idea for a film (based on the book) but everything you'd want to see in it, they leave out...(how lives are destroyed by the inhuman terminations...) go figure... No one is changed in this movie, no one is really touched and Miss Keener gets a great job at the end (leading me to believe she might get fired later by someone like Ryan had this been a good movie).
The Road (2009)
Not worth the trip... Slight Spoiler but Related to Theme
This film is a dull disappointment at best. I have not read the book nor plan to. It astounds me how many people are impressed with this unbalanced, relatively lacklustre film. The dismal scenery wouldn't be so much the problem had the material itself been worthwhile.
I'm not one to be afraid of bleak material. A work of art should never have to explain itself but there has to be structure, variety of themes, ideas, coherence and plausibility. The Road is a plausible story but tailored to an audience without a sense of humour, people who happen to revel in pessimism and continually find the much abused 'redemption' theme somehow original in an industry saturated with Holocaust films and romantic comedies. (If it isn't the rush to the airport scenario/make-up scenes, its the release of a prisoner.) The human character is far more complex than this film would you lead to believe. The acting is good, acceptable but at times it would be nice to see a smile, let alone a nuance as opposed to the three blasting emotional tenors of fear, anguish and sorrow. Imagine listening to a song with only minor chords and you'll understand that there is virtually no spectrum here, let alone a hint of subtlety in the performances. Viggo is good but one gets the impression he could have 'mailed' it in (to borrow a much-used cliché).
One thing I continually find difficult is that for a man who is determined to get somewhere like Viggo's character, wouldn't he have greater emotional tools as well as survival skills to get to his goal? We understand he has endured a great deal and a man can only take so much but wouldn't there be evidence of his deeper will in his coping? Watching the film I only saw physical reactions to the hostile environment and never human, below the surface ones.
The viewer has to ask his or herself - is watching this film an exercise in spiritual let alone intellectual masochism? Without any character development, without a sympathetic lead, the audience is only trudging along miserably with our two supposed 'heroes' and for a discerning viewer, one should eventually feel cheated with this film's reliance on the visceral to provide sustenance instead of a story. There is nothing really at stake in this movie beyond survival. The post-apocalyptic world of The Road is empty, colourless and seemingly devoid of relationships. Sure the father loves his son and there are some tender moments but the unconditional love for the child by the father cannot carry a story.
But somehow I get the impression that the politics of Oscar will somehow keep this film on the clunky pop-cultural radar. For me, it is a case of the Emperor's New Clothes and I'm tired of seeing Viggo's ass.
Bill (2007)
Pleasant, Fun and Worth the Watch
This is a great Saturday night film. It borders somewhere between comedy and dramedy in that the topic veers often towards the all-too-serious before falling back into the comical.
Aaron Eckhart plays 'Bill'. Bill married the bank executive's daughter. Bill has it all but doesn't have much respect from his wife's family. His in-laws basically think of him as a peon. When Bill's wife cheats on him, things get a little rough. I have to give the writer and director kudos for not driving the film into the conventional 'another shot at life' take here i.e. character falls to the bottom, builds himself up by cutting off all ties.
He does build himself back up, but the pacing is subtle, real, human. Life is life, right, and Bill manages to pull himself together without making big dramatic scenes (a la Jerry Maguire) or bringing us some touching, knee-jerk morals and last minute epiphanies. He stumbles, breaks down and when you figure he'll win the girl in the end, he just wins himself.
The 'Kid' here is fun, Bill learns a lot from him but again, no morals, no 'kid knows best' B.S. here. The film dodges a few of the main clichés we see in most movies.
I thoroughly enjoyed this film. It isn't meant to be serious and it could have been. The writing is fun, the directing is fun, the characters are fun. What's wrong with fun?
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (2008)
A disappointment
The disappointment I feel is perhaps more for David Fincher's career than this film. Everything on the surface of 'The Curious Case of Benjamin Button' appears beautiful - the cinematography, the special effects, the make-up, the cast... everything is about eye candy. It is sweet but like sweets containing high glucose corn syrup, it leaves one irritable and certainly dissatisfied.
I find with most critiques of mainstream, big budget films those who fall into two camps - those taken in by the hype, by the surface of the film and those who feel and understand the film, aware of its flaws. It is the same with bestseller novels.
First of all, the concept of this film was unique. Let us at least take notice of F.Scott Fitzgerald who may or may not have stolen the idea/material from his wife Zelda (whom many scholars believe was the true genius and not her husband). Origins aside, the film has all the trimmings of previous work.
There are some people who are vehement about this being 'not Forest Gump'. I would stress the similarities between the two films and the fact Eric Roth wrote both.
Let us take note of the obvious:
Atypical hero: Forest Gump/Benjamin Button Love Interest Jenny/Daisy Mother (with similar accents) Hero's 'war involvement' Vietnam War/WWII Setting American South/American South Leitmotif Feather/Hummingbird
There are others but those are the most obvious. Let us also remind ourselves both films are narrated by the hero who both happen to have interesting and 'profound' observations about life and their lives.
But if it were simply a matter of being Forest Gump, then I would still have high praise for Benjamin Button. Not so. The majority of this film remains on the surface. Despite all the observations, despite the epic sweep of events that pass through the narrative, we as an audience are rarely allowed to go deeper. Again, the film was based on a unique idea but without the human psychology, without more background on several characters, I found it difficult to relate to any of these characters.
Benjamin Button. He is born old, he grows young. That's all we really know. He lives with old people, he learns to play the piano, he leaves home, he travels, he sees the world. Most of the narrative is about places and meeting people, rarely about being involved with others, what it means or feels like to relate to a world that sees him as old. He is an outsider. How does this feel? We don't really know as an audience. The film is entirely experiential, rarely psychological.
Daisy. We know she had a grandmother. We knows she loves to dance. But little else. What motivated her to dance, why did she love dancing? We don't know. And of course, why of all things did she not have a relationship with her daughter?
The relationship: A man returns from war. He meets a woman that used to be the girl he loved. The woman wants to seduce him. She attempts. He steps back. When this occurs in the film, we don't really understand the reasoning nor the purpose of the scene. Daisy is in town one day. Her and Benjamin go out together. Why is sex so important to Daisy? And why do we have to watch the two characters go back and forth before they land up together? When he visits her in New York, she is immature, a school girl attempting to get him jealous. Yet he is still attracted to her.
There are so many other questions I have about this film and so many things that simply do not make sense. The main one that comes to mind: if you are a dancer, someone who is professionally trained, why in any circumstances would you even think of dancing on a crowded street? The scene in which Daisy was hit by a car was for too unbelievable. She is first held up by a friend with a broken shoe lace. Daisy remains behind. In such a situation, when you have to wait for someone, the last thing you want to do is fool around after waiting. The scene felt convoluted and dumb - not tragic.
The montage in which Daisy and Benjamin find themselves together plays out like all other young lover clichés - they travel together, they make love, they buy a love, they make love in their home, they paint their home (there is a brief, albeit clichéd 'lovers painting the wall' scene ... yawn...seen it...). I didn't find this film to be magical, just a mosaic of previous formulas and scenarios. Benjamin 'youthens', he leaves her. He comes back later. Throughout the entire film, the audience really doesn't know or understand or get a sense of what it means to grow 'young' nor what kind of effect it might have on others.
I felt very tired after watching this picture. The first half was not bad. My interest was kept, I enjoyed the characters but when I started feeling lost and cheated, that I would never get any closer to the lives, feelings and deeper philosophies, and what with some of the frustrating scenes between Daisy and Benjamin, I began to grow impatient.