When watching the films of the Sonnet Project, it is of course normal to focus on the performance, how well the film was made and how much work went into shooting it. The film of sonnet 74 is one of several that makes me realize just how much work went into the design of the project even before a single director had stepped up to have a go; it does so by how well selected the location is here. I had seen in the film title that the location was the John Lennon memorial in Central Park and as I read the sonnet text ahead of watching, it was obviously such a great fit. The sonnet is about death but how it is the spirit that matters and, even after death and worms have taken the body, it is the spirit as captured in writing that will remain. The connection is obvious and even reading it thinking of Lennon did stir emotions and helps make the sonnet clearer. To a certain extent it seemed like a lot of work had been done for the film before it even started.
Perhaps this was the problem then; that the material was so obvious that the film tried to stay away from it? Or that it had an open goal and, like a millionaire English footballer in the same position, fluffed it over the bar. I might be a bit harsh because of this, but to me the film didn't really work and seemed to almost deliberately clutter itself with unnecessary touches. The film is presented with an odd color tint and, after a brief look at the memorial, we shift the focus to the actor. He delivers his line perfectly well, but the film cuts around him for no real reason – overlapping his audio in an annoying way. This audio effect isn't helped by the terrible music throughout – I didn't like it (which is personal taste) but it is of a volume that competes with the dialogue, which is not a good thing. The actor's performance seems affect as he delivers in shifts and in multiple takes. The footage of him and his girlfriend at the end don't really work as they should either.
Okay, maybe if the film had spent the whole sonnet just having shots of the memorial then the overly-critical side of me would have moaned that it didn't do anything other than the obvious, but I do think this would have been preferable to saying that it didn't do very much that worked – which is sadly the case. The choice of location is spot on, which only makes it a bigger shame that the film didn't capitalize on that good foundation.