thomasjay-52277
Fantastically shot and acted this is one brilliant film about grief, loss and family with compelling characters and a stunning setting the story follows Casey Affleck's character taking on his nephew, son of his Now late brother and shows the growth of the characters post the death of the relative. Fantastically structured and extremely emotional this is a brilliant movie
Edgar Soberon Torchia
The appropriate use of music in films is one of the crucial problems of current cinema, especially in American movies. It is a formula inherited from Tiomkin, Steiner, Waxman, Korngold and Herrmann, and the filmmakers for whom they musicalized: together they packed the complete product (as in "Gone with the Wind"), without knowing when to stop the music. However, almost a century has passed, sound has made great advances and the effect of omnipresent music has become obnoxious. Was it necessary to punctuate the tragedy of Lee Chandler (Casey Affleck) for eight endless minutes, since the moment he goes out to the store one fatidic night, until the scene when he leaves the office of the lawyer who has read his brother's will, with cloying adagio by Albinoni or whoever composed it? For me, the music selection is the detrimental aspect of the film: it has nothing to do with the history, but with the unrestrained sentimentality of director Kenneth Lonergan. I liked the uncle-nephew interplay and all the great drama about pain and death ... The excellent performances by the whole cast are enough to transmit everything! Lee's silences and fists of anger, the panic attack of his nephew Patrick (Lucas Hedges), the dialogue of guilt and forgiveness between Lee and his ex-wife Randi (Michelle Williams), the loneliness of Sandy's mother, Jill (Heather Burns)... The inclusion of classics is redundant and mawkish (and the "house composer", Lesley Barber, was caught up, judging from his title chorale), gaining more presence than such an adequate soundtrack as the voices of Bob Dylan, Ella Fitzgerald or The Ink Spots. The director did not contain himself. The classics were good for "Barry Lyndon." Kubrick excelled at that. Even the hyper-contrast between "The Blue Danube" and the spacecraft in "2001, a Space Odyssey" was a brilliant move. But Mr. Lonergan is no Kubrick. With 10 or 15 minutes less, a selection of the American songbook and the classics saved for when he drives his car down the road, Kenneth Lonergan would have made a perfect film.
andrew_james10
Depressed? I have seen many depressing movies. I have seen many bad movies, but this is both. I stuck with it because of the accolades assuming it would spark into life at some point. Sadly not. If the pregnant pauses were taken out of this film it would have lasted less than an hour. A lot of the scenes started with an inexplicable pause let alone the ones added during the dialog. Very difficult to watch. Boring, unnecessary length of time taken with each scene most of which had little to do with the story, just repeating the turmoil of each character and, boy, they had so much turmoil. If being depressed wins you an Academy Award this wins hands down. I don't think that acting depressed is too difficult. No change in emotion during what felt like three hours is not too hard to play but by God it's hard to watch.
