(no subject)

[prog]

Crappy day at work, so on a whim, saw Silver City, which I knew nothing about, other than the amusing confluence of events that spurred me to choose this film over Sky Captain or whatever. (I could have also seen ResFest at the Brattle, but... I tend to stay away from short-film festival things now. In my experience, they tend to be 25 percent fabulous and amazing, 25 percent meh, and 50 percent Oh my god, shut up, you pretentious hack. The price just isn't worth it if I can't fast-forward through the off-pissing krep.) Alas, the confluence was more amusing than the movie. While Ebert & Roeper apparently went nuts about it, I see that the Globe reviewer gave it 1.5 stars, which is closer to my reaction. Quickly, my thoughts before I read that review:

I liked it OK but can't really recommend it; my main beef was that the lead role was terribly acted. Or maybe "barely acted". The guy was supposed to be a private detective, and acted more like someone playing a private detective in a role-playing game. Speaking his lines and emoting just enough to show that he was paying attention; otherwise taking it easy, helping himself to some more Cheetos. It was kind of embarrassing to watch all the secondary characters else act the hell out of him at every dialogue.

There was positive audience reaction from the anti-GWB bones the film tossed out every now and again, but that was about it. The story was kind of interesting, I guess, with a lot of stuff happening and a clear and intentionally unsatisfying resolution to all of it. There are ways to do this well, especially in political satire. I am not sure that this hit any of them.