There are three all-too-brief moments in this movie when I loved what I was experiencing. For a 114-minute film, that’s not enough. Nevertheless, it’s better than many.
Adapting any bestselling novel for the screen is challenging enough, but one that is predicated on whimsy is well nigh unattainable. I see that Peter Bradshaw in The Guardian dismisses this film as “sentimentality and whimsy”. Well, the sentimentality factor is certainly there, but not imho dangerously emetic.
And as for whimsy... sorry, but since when has whimsy been a thought crime?
Whimsy per se isn’t bad. The Grand Budapest Hotel is nothing if not whimsy - and Box office Mojo tells me there are currently at least, 164,757,709 reasons why that film cannot be so haughtily dismissed, Mr. Bradshaw. OK?
However. This is Scandinavian whimsy. No, not an oxymoron - although there are moments when I found my mind drifting to entirely other matters, which is far from the hallmark of an engrossing movie. To be honest, it does plod – quite a lot.
A final observation. Vince Gilligan, producer of the iconic Breaking Bad, recently observed that an audience would accept deus ex machina plot points only if they served to make our protagonist’s position worse: not better.
And yes, I can see exactly what he means.
But.
In this movie, there are a ton of fortuitous interventions from above. They are invariably positive, and invariably get our protagonist out of a scrape.
And we love them.
Which goes to show... I think... that rules are there first to be understood... and then to be broken...
Adapting any bestselling novel for the screen is challenging enough, but one that is predicated on whimsy is well nigh unattainable. I see that Peter Bradshaw in The Guardian dismisses this film as “sentimentality and whimsy”. Well, the sentimentality factor is certainly there, but not imho dangerously emetic.
And as for whimsy... sorry, but since when has whimsy been a thought crime?
Whimsy per se isn’t bad. The Grand Budapest Hotel is nothing if not whimsy - and Box office Mojo tells me there are currently at least, 164,757,709 reasons why that film cannot be so haughtily dismissed, Mr. Bradshaw. OK?
However. This is Scandinavian whimsy. No, not an oxymoron - although there are moments when I found my mind drifting to entirely other matters, which is far from the hallmark of an engrossing movie. To be honest, it does plod – quite a lot.
A final observation. Vince Gilligan, producer of the iconic Breaking Bad, recently observed that an audience would accept deus ex machina plot points only if they served to make our protagonist’s position worse: not better.
And yes, I can see exactly what he means.
But.
In this movie, there are a ton of fortuitous interventions from above. They are invariably positive, and invariably get our protagonist out of a scrape.
And we love them.
Which goes to show... I think... that rules are there first to be understood... and then to be broken...
