this movie actually seems pretty damn good, but it's hard...it's like the problem with the mark david chapman films...do you go see a film about a true life killer and enjoy it? is it exploitative? is it giving the killer what they wanted in the first place? i have no idea. but this looks good. and also he killed himself so there's a difference between him and chapman right there, even if he wanted infamy, he isn't around to enjoy it so fuck it.
Going in, I knew nothing about this film and unfairly, when I heard Meryl Streep was in this movie, I assumed it would be a bloated dramatic waste of a few hours. I was, however, wrong. The film started out as this quasi-comedy and I enoyed all of the quirks. Meryl Streep was absolutely amazing in the film as Joanna and I thought she had this great odd chemistry with Liu Ye?s character. Unfortunately, the tone shifted and the film just went downhill, finishing with one of the most ridiculous endings, for the direction the tale had taken, I have ever seen.
Dark Matter,? directed by Chen Shi-Sheng, displays how treading in foreign territory, geographically and can be the biggest obstacle you may ever face.
Ok, maybe I went too far. I won't say it is the most ridiculous, but it was definitely up there with film school cliche type of endings that was just uncalled for with the rest of the film, the seeming need to add edginess for edginess's sake. Supposedly this is based on a true story but I feel that cinematically the transition can be rough. Granted I know nothing about the true story behind this, but I have tried to look it up (with no results). In my opinion, the ending was the biggest mistake the director could have made with this film.
This is a great film, to a point. Unfortunately the ending doesn't deliver, making the entire feature an exercise is wasted potential. But maybe that's the point. Its out limited in a few weeks.
MCT:April 17, 2008
MCT:March 28, 2008
