Wednesday, January 2, 2013

Seven Psychopaths

SF: There was a lot of hype for this film, given that it is written by Martin McDonagh I could see the potential,  In Bruges (7/10) was most enjoyable.
Sadly the fantasy and reality are starkly different. Firstly the entire meta approach of watching while the writer comes up with the concepts and themes for the very film your seeing is very annoying and not particularly interesting. As there is no real plot, just the promise of one, it would difficult to categorise. I think the film makers were attempting to make a black comedy but it seemed more like an excuse to showcase ideas rather than an actual film. Also the over use of dramatic irony is equally irritating rather than entertaining. Only two character held my interest played by Christopher Walken and Tom Waits, it is a shame they get such little screen time. The film remained funny in parts but suffered from trying so hard to be witty that all your left with is painfully forced dialogue holding together something that needs a lot more work. Did anyone else think it was a bit like Tales from the Crypt? 4.5/10

50Eggs: n/a

DonkeyB: Let's start at the beginning, the opening scene on the dam, is brilliant, witty and funny. The rest of the film I hated. After 20 minutes I would have walked out but the cinema was packed and we were too far from the end of the row. I can promise eveyone reading that I did not laugh once after the scene on the dam. I hated the film, on every level, I thought the violence was pointless and pornopgraphic. SF is correct- the film is "meta", what this means in this case is that Christopher Walken's character gets to be the 'producer' type character, giving 'notes' to the 'writer' character, this apparently means the film can be a stupid, mysogynistic and dull as it likes as long as Hans points it out- well not in my book. I found the stupidity, violence and mysogyny very irritating and then got even more angry when Christopher Walken pointed out to me that I was still watching it. I am sure that Martin McDonagh's brother had read an early draft for this lazy stupid script when he wrote the infintely funnier The Guard and included this little exchange. I found myself desperate to scream "you're a sociopath not a psychopath" at the screen repeatedly, but will gladly settle for a chance to bellow it at any and all of the people associated with the film at some point in the future. 0/10 Most angry I've ever been about a film.

Overall: 2.25/10

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