This is my first movie review and The Imitation Game probably isn't the best place to start - Nightcrawler and Guardians of the Galaxy are both great opportunities missed. No, it definitely isn't the best place to start. I mean, what are the odds that any given movie is the best place to start. I'll try and curb this kind of drivel - that's not the style of writing I'm going for. Not with these movie reviews at least.
Anyway, this is my first review and so here're a few disclaimers. One. Popular opinion has an effect on how much I (dis)like a movie. With fun movies, positive feedback from the movie watching community biases me in their favour. The effect is opposite with serious movies. But it's only noticeable with them self-indulgent pieces of shit that're far less smart (many positive adjectives work here - smart's the one that ticks me off the most) than their makers make them out to be. I'm usually aware of this phenomenon (ooh, a phenomenon) when it's happening, and will try and acknowledge it at appropriate times. (Should probably make this a section in my reviews. The structure in this first one is going to be winged. I promise the reader more respect in the future)
Two. Opinions of mine, on certain aspects of a movie, can make me misremember its details to fit neatly into my reasoning scheme. Can't do much about that. That's all the disclaimers I can think of right now. As you may have noticed, so far I haven't made a great effort in curbing that kind of drivel. And frankly, I think this is getting too silly.
One last thing before I begin the actual review. These reviews will be targeted primarily towards those who've seen the movies, not those deciding if they should.
Spoilers to follow
<review>
Foreword: Weighing the rave reviews against the hype factors (premise of the movie and the cast), I expected it to be a decent watch, going in. And it is. But this review will aim to balance out all the positive mojo surrounding the fairly uninspired The Imitation Game.
The movie is based on Alan Turing's life. An apparently reclusive, antisocial, homosexual genius played by Benedict Cumberbatch (the audition tapes are available for purchase at http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b018ttws/products). The movie follows three interweaving timelines. One from... Wait, you either already know this, or don't want to know from this review. Fuck it (Am new at this. Cut me some slack).
Unlike Sherlock, Turing, despite being super eccentric, was fairly believable (none of that "I didn't realize I'm your best friend despite being able to tell that your son is pregnant by sniffing your belly button" bullshit). And in the first half Cumberbatch sparkled lifelessly with the emotionless dialogue delivery he was typecast to do - an art form that I'm not convinced demands immense skill. But does the movie itself have to be lifeless just because it's hero is?
The acting in the high-school timeline lacked emotions. Warm emotions you would expect a young boy falling in love to have. Troubled ones you would expect a young boy falling in love with another boy to have, when homosexuality was illegal - and dangerously so. It felt more like a photoshoot with the director going 'Alright give me a blush. Now give me one with fear and doubt. Don't forget to face the ground and look timid. Bravo! And that's a wrap'. What I mean is everything felt so plasticky. Mind you, the idea was not that he doesn't have emotions. But in the quest to make him reclusive, they made the character a potato.
The plasticky feeling extends to most other characters (Christopher in particular) and to the movie itself on the whole. When they interweave scenes from the war with those of the cryptographers' unsuccess, and you're, I assume, supposed to feel the gravity of their work, the race against time and the associated stress, you feel nothing. When the German tank rolls over a helmet of the allies', you're feeling potatoes. And I don't mean in the way this guy here does.
It gets better, for the better (meaning no sarcasm), in the second half though. A few genuine smiles from Kiera Knightly (as Joan Clarke), a few moments of edginess from Cumberbatch. Peter Hilton's (played by Mathew Beard) plea for his brother's life. But you still feel nothing when Turing's comrades perform a touching act of comradery by threatening to quit if their comrading comrade is fired.
What is interesting is that somehow all this lifelessness, instead of making the movie god awful, feels alright and natural and even lends it an air of sophistication (not that I'm the type that falls for that shit). It's probably because its a period drama - it doesn't have to feel real anymore.
This is nitpicking, but a paragraph on the scene where Turing tries to send Joan away by confessing that he's gay and she wants to stay. When two people pretty much know what the other is thinking and is about to say, but desperately want to convince them of otherwise, there's a certain impatience in hearing them out, a certain 'Yeah yeah, but I don't care' attitude that Joan seemed to be lacking. And that conversation ended way to easily too (this isn't nitpicking), unless we are to believe that she was convinced by his 'I never cared for you' response. Also, the way Cumberbatch straightens up and delivers that line in a way that's fitting of a reclusive genius, might feel like awesometastic acting. But, I believe it is far easier than delivering the same line in a way that's believably convincing to Joan, while letting the audience know what's really going on. Not that his character is supposed to be any good at that. Just saying.
A word on the science before I wind up. When they have this realization at the bar that they can use predictable parts of the actual messages to restrict the set of keys to go through, I was like what the fuck has Christopher been doing all this time? Just avoiding keys (passwords) that map the same letter to itself, and some other such nonsense and slogging away at the rest? And how the fuck is it supposed to know when it's hit upon the right key - does it have a fucking dictionary on board? Not that this bothered me much. Besides it's good for the movie to have a eureka moment, I suppose. But the using statistics to decide which information to act on and which ones to ignore part was nice. And I loved it when Stewart Menzies (played by Mark Strong), the MI6 agent, goes 'I wish you were the Russian agent' and asks him to help him decide what's best to leak to the Russians through their not-so-bright spy.
Getting a tl;dr vibe from this post. So I'll wind up soon. The whole Turing test routine (can you judge me if I'm a man or machine) and the 'Don't assume that you're in control just because you're where you are and I am where I am. Make no mistake - I'm in control' line that connects the ending to the opening of the movie are similar to The Dark Knight's 'He's not a hero Gotham needs right now. He's the one Gotham deserves.' Make no sense, but understandable why people would be woah-ed by them. And the sad climax despite portraying slightly better acting, didn't do much to save the movie in my eyes.
To sum up, uninspired and lifeless - probably because I can't appreciate art. Yet it's popularity is understandable. Decent movie and worth a watch, at least for the hype, if for no other reason.
Rating: 7.0/10 (A peep into my head: 5 doesn't have sufficient range and 100 is too fine)
</review>
Anyway, this is my first review and so here're a few disclaimers. One. Popular opinion has an effect on how much I (dis)like a movie. With fun movies, positive feedback from the movie watching community biases me in their favour. The effect is opposite with serious movies. But it's only noticeable with them self-indulgent pieces of shit that're far less smart (many positive adjectives work here - smart's the one that ticks me off the most) than their makers make them out to be. I'm usually aware of this phenomenon (ooh, a phenomenon) when it's happening, and will try and acknowledge it at appropriate times. (Should probably make this a section in my reviews. The structure in this first one is going to be winged. I promise the reader more respect in the future)
Two. Opinions of mine, on certain aspects of a movie, can make me misremember its details to fit neatly into my reasoning scheme. Can't do much about that. That's all the disclaimers I can think of right now. As you may have noticed, so far I haven't made a great effort in curbing that kind of drivel. And frankly, I think this is getting too silly.
"Quite agree, quite agree. Silly, silly, silly. Right. Get on with it. Get on with it."
- Graham Chapman
One last thing before I begin the actual review. These reviews will be targeted primarily towards those who've seen the movies, not those deciding if they should.
Spoilers to follow
<review>
Foreword: Weighing the rave reviews against the hype factors (premise of the movie and the cast), I expected it to be a decent watch, going in. And it is. But this review will aim to balance out all the positive mojo surrounding the fairly uninspired The Imitation Game.
The movie is based on Alan Turing's life. An apparently reclusive, antisocial, homosexual genius played by Benedict Cumberbatch (the audition tapes are available for purchase at http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b018ttws/products). The movie follows three interweaving timelines. One from... Wait, you either already know this, or don't want to know from this review. Fuck it (Am new at this. Cut me some slack).
Unlike Sherlock, Turing, despite being super eccentric, was fairly believable (none of that "I didn't realize I'm your best friend despite being able to tell that your son is pregnant by sniffing your belly button" bullshit). And in the first half Cumberbatch sparkled lifelessly with the emotionless dialogue delivery he was typecast to do - an art form that I'm not convinced demands immense skill. But does the movie itself have to be lifeless just because it's hero is?
The acting in the high-school timeline lacked emotions. Warm emotions you would expect a young boy falling in love to have. Troubled ones you would expect a young boy falling in love with another boy to have, when homosexuality was illegal - and dangerously so. It felt more like a photoshoot with the director going 'Alright give me a blush. Now give me one with fear and doubt. Don't forget to face the ground and look timid. Bravo! And that's a wrap'. What I mean is everything felt so plasticky. Mind you, the idea was not that he doesn't have emotions. But in the quest to make him reclusive, they made the character a potato.
The plasticky feeling extends to most other characters (Christopher in particular) and to the movie itself on the whole. When they interweave scenes from the war with those of the cryptographers' unsuccess, and you're, I assume, supposed to feel the gravity of their work, the race against time and the associated stress, you feel nothing. When the German tank rolls over a helmet of the allies', you're feeling potatoes. And I don't mean in the way this guy here does.
It gets better, for the better (meaning no sarcasm), in the second half though. A few genuine smiles from Kiera Knightly (as Joan Clarke), a few moments of edginess from Cumberbatch. Peter Hilton's (played by Mathew Beard) plea for his brother's life. But you still feel nothing when Turing's comrades perform a touching act of comradery by threatening to quit if their comrading comrade is fired.
What is interesting is that somehow all this lifelessness, instead of making the movie god awful, feels alright and natural and even lends it an air of sophistication (not that I'm the type that falls for that shit). It's probably because its a period drama - it doesn't have to feel real anymore.
This is nitpicking, but a paragraph on the scene where Turing tries to send Joan away by confessing that he's gay and she wants to stay. When two people pretty much know what the other is thinking and is about to say, but desperately want to convince them of otherwise, there's a certain impatience in hearing them out, a certain 'Yeah yeah, but I don't care' attitude that Joan seemed to be lacking. And that conversation ended way to easily too (this isn't nitpicking), unless we are to believe that she was convinced by his 'I never cared for you' response. Also, the way Cumberbatch straightens up and delivers that line in a way that's fitting of a reclusive genius, might feel like awesometastic acting. But, I believe it is far easier than delivering the same line in a way that's believably convincing to Joan, while letting the audience know what's really going on. Not that his character is supposed to be any good at that. Just saying.
A word on the science before I wind up. When they have this realization at the bar that they can use predictable parts of the actual messages to restrict the set of keys to go through, I was like what the fuck has Christopher been doing all this time? Just avoiding keys (passwords) that map the same letter to itself, and some other such nonsense and slogging away at the rest? And how the fuck is it supposed to know when it's hit upon the right key - does it have a fucking dictionary on board? Not that this bothered me much. Besides it's good for the movie to have a eureka moment, I suppose. But the using statistics to decide which information to act on and which ones to ignore part was nice. And I loved it when Stewart Menzies (played by Mark Strong), the MI6 agent, goes 'I wish you were the Russian agent' and asks him to help him decide what's best to leak to the Russians through their not-so-bright spy.
Getting a tl;dr vibe from this post. So I'll wind up soon. The whole Turing test routine (can you judge me if I'm a man or machine) and the 'Don't assume that you're in control just because you're where you are and I am where I am. Make no mistake - I'm in control' line that connects the ending to the opening of the movie are similar to The Dark Knight's 'He's not a hero Gotham needs right now. He's the one Gotham deserves.' Make no sense, but understandable why people would be woah-ed by them. And the sad climax despite portraying slightly better acting, didn't do much to save the movie in my eyes.
To sum up, uninspired and lifeless - probably because I can't appreciate art. Yet it's popularity is understandable. Decent movie and worth a watch, at least for the hype, if for no other reason.
Rating: 7.0/10 (A peep into my head: 5 doesn't have sufficient range and 100 is too fine)
</review>
