I saw this film at the opening of the Karlovy Vary film festival. The story focuses on the themes of identity, vanity and the constant pressure to improve our own personal appearance. The story revolves around the central female character who undergoes radical plastic surgery in order to ensure that her lover does not grow bored of her appearance. The narrative builds an increasingly complex story woven around the central female and male characters and also utilises 3-4 key locations including a coffee shop and sculpture park. Yet the narrative is very unevenly paced - initially it deliberately takes very little time to set the basic premise of the story, but then after dragging out the middle section of the story, the final series of events seem to pass at a frankly ludicrous pace. Little time is taken to explore motives or explain events and as a result potentially dramatic scenes are given little context. One reviewer was surprised that the audience at the premiere laughed during serious scenes - my personal opinion is that many viewers found the events unbelievable and unrealistic - hence the incredulous reaction. This problem was further compounded by a weak performance from the central male character. The character is largely bewildered by events but then as the story unfolds he goes through wider mood swings that are not conveyed in a way that makes the viewer believe or empathise with these emotions. Personally - I found as the story developed I gradually lost interest in the characters and the conclusion to the story was predictable, convenient and over-engineered.
Reviews
2 Reviews
Goodbye, Dragon Inn
(2003)
Hard work even for the most committed movie-goer
4 November 2003
Seeing this as part of the London Film Festival I had few expectations of the movie and was initially pleased to see the large cinema was a almost a sell-out. However, by the end of this 82 minute feature approximately a quarter of the audience had walked out and to be honest I am surprised that so many remained. Bravely, the film appears to ignore most conventions for film-making; dialogue, narrative and character development are rarely in evidence. The long still shots and selective use of sound (focusing primarily on footsteps and 'small' sounds from within the scene) created an eerie atmosphere but the film's content failed to capitalise on this platform to generate further interest in the characters or development of the themes.
Other films and directors (Tarkovsky) have created genuinely unique movies which have required significant commitment from the audience. However, on this occasion the director strays too far, the film demands too much from the viewer and offers scant return for this time. It reminded me of the experience of seeing a Russian film of the early 90s, The Stone (dir Sokurov), both these films require significant concentration and commitment from their viewers yet for me they both signify the excesses of arthouse cinema.
Other films and directors (Tarkovsky) have created genuinely unique movies which have required significant commitment from the audience. However, on this occasion the director strays too far, the film demands too much from the viewer and offers scant return for this time. It reminded me of the experience of seeing a Russian film of the early 90s, The Stone (dir Sokurov), both these films require significant concentration and commitment from their viewers yet for me they both signify the excesses of arthouse cinema.
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