sanjay lathish
Been a fan of viggo mortensen since watching lord of the rings trilogy and eastern promises. The attitude/screen presence this guy can bring to the screen is near perfect and can only be matched by some, and he delivers yet again in the cronenberg movie A History of Violence. As the name suggest the violence in the movie is good, the action scenes are superbly coordinated. The story gets predictable as the movie goes, but still Cronenberg keeps us immersed in the movie. u know cronenberg is a great directer by just watching the opening scenes which include the family of the protagonist. at the very moment we will feel the bond between the family. every family member did their utmost best, special mention for Maria Bello(as she was great as the wife). the character development of the protagonist is well and tightly done. if you loved eastern promise, i am sure u will love this one too.
zenpunks
...sums it up for me. I didn't have a great deal of expectation as I got to see this movie for free on Amazon Prime -missed it when it was first out. The film is 12 years old but it's bad now and for it's time -as much as movies have changed and audiences have gotten smarter -it doesn't matter a well done movie is a well done movie period from any time and this isn't! I agree with all the previous reviews in why the movie is lacking: underdeveloped story and characters - ridiculous action scenes that lack suspense, surprise and might as well be in slow motion -sex scenes and full frontal nudity that are completely out of place and no real history to the characters beside Toms'(Viggo Mortensen) "history of violence" which isn't ever really fully explained -he screwed with bad people in his shady past- I don't care enough about the character to care! I'd be more interested in how he came to this small town and chose to stay, how he met his wife and how they fell in love and the changes that happen to him as he becomes a husband, a father and a better person. All of that is just assumed in a sophomoric connect the dots kind of way as should be expected based on a graphic novel -there is a deeper, fuller, much better story here that's never realized -it's too bad cause David Cronenberg has done much better work (check out The Dead Zone) - (*spoiler alert*) the whole killing off of the 3 bad guys (including Ed Harris' character) and how that is swept under the rug -where is the town reaction, news etc. -after such a big deal was made about Tom being a hero??? someone already in the spotlight would have even more attention on them just days later after a triple murder on their property??? I feel like this movie should have been much longer and should have taken at least 30-40 minutes or more to establish itself and Tom's life in small town (Millbrook, Indiana) America -before the bad guys show up (Think of the movie Witness and why we care about the characters...) And yes the movie has violence and to me it doesn't matter or work for the film - like Quentin Tarantino's movies are often violent but because they are so well done and you care about the characters the violence is a working part of the story and doesn't degrade it. This movie lacks everything: story, real characters and even violence that matters or works!!
midas-jacobs
"A History of Violence". In the so called movie, we meet our protagonist Tom Stall (Viggo Mortensen), a normal dad, well it seems like that anyway. When he is forced to kill two people, to save the life of a woman, his past starts to catch up with him..."A History of Violence" is directed by David Cronenberg. He did a very good job at directing it. What also added to the movie was that he'd worked with Viggo Mortensen before (Eastern Promises). He also used some shots, that not a lot of movies would dare to use, but it worked in this movie. He has his own special style, which is a very good style. That he has his own style is also a good thing, you can have your own style like Micheal Bay, but also like Christopher Nolan, and he is reaching to the Nolan side. If that made some sense for you. The cinematography was good too, every shot looked pretty, and I don't really have to say anything else about this part. Like my title says there is a lot of violence, well not just my title, but also the title of the movie. The violence is done very good. The blood looked great, just like the gore. Not at one point in the movie I would say that it was obviously fake. Theses scenes were also very well directed. How he showed you things, and some things not, so there could be a reveal. But he also forced you to look at specific things in these shots. Birilliantly directed. The soundtrack of the movie was very good too, so was the costume design. The sound, not the soundtrack, was well edited and chosen. The issue that I have with the movie, is that there were some moments that it felt like they dubbed over some of the movie parts. An example is early on in the movie when Tom and his wife are sitting in the car, and having a conversation. The make-up of the eye of Fogarty was also very good. You knew that it was fake, but it looked convincing enough. The editing was good to, I only managed to catch one mistake, so that's good. (The son switches arm position between edits in the locker room)The acting was one of the big and best parts. The main character, our protagonist, is like I've said, Tom Stall. Tom was played by Viggo Mortensen. I knew that he could act from seeing "The road" and the "Lord of the Rings" trilogy, but I think that he did one of his best acting jobs in this movie. He was very convincing as a normal house dad, but also how he could make the switch in becoming a killer called Joey, his past self. On the characters I'll touch a bit later on in this review. But he was very good. The next person I'm going to talk about is his wife. She is called Edie Stall, and was played by the lovely Maria Bello. She was very good too. From her we got to see a more emotional side, which she handled very well. This is a hard part for some actors, but not for her. The antagonist of "A History of Violence" was Carl Fogarty, he was played by Ed Harris. Ed Harris is a very good villain. In this movie, but also in a lot of other movies. You also have the helpers of the story, these are the son and daughter of Tom. The son had a bigger role. He was very good. The rest of the supporting cast was good as well.The script was for me the best part of the movie, followed by the acting. The dialogue was good, and funny even at moments. The characters were well created and original. For example the interesting character of Tom. You were left in the dark with him, and slowly as the movie progressed, you got to know more of him. This was a very good feature. You could guess what was going on, but you weren't entirely sure about it. The story was good too, just one thing that I didn't like, but what was necessarily to the story. This was the side storyline of the son and his cliché bully. At first I thought that it was just one cliché bit, and that it was unnecessarily, but this builds up to a character arc. And eventually to a similar one, again. This was a Love-Hate part for me. The other characters were also well made, but not always developed. This wasn't something that would add to the movie, so I'm glad that they didn't put big effort in that. The story decreases in quality for me near the end. It still stays good, but not as good as the previous part, that's why the movie loses a point, for me and goes from a nine to a 8.1. That was my review for the "A History of Violence". I think that this was a very good movie, it's dark and gritty. It has great characters and great violence. 8.1/10
