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Mystic River (2003)
Director: Clint Eastwood
Cast overview: Sean Penn, Tim Robbins
Running time: 138 minutes
This had all the makings of a film I would like - one of my favourite film figures, Clint Eastwood, behind the camera, alongside a strong cast, an intriguing-sounding mystery from the work of a writer who has had work successfully adapted to the screen elsewhere. Yet I didn't like it. Where do I start?
OK, I found the bit at the very start featuring the kidnapping to be an excellent, chilling, and angering scene. I thought I was in for a great, yet depressing, film. Well, I was half-right. It's depressing, all right, but unfortunately that tends to veer towards the depressingly dull.
Firstly, the acting wasn't fantastic - Robbins aside, who has been excellent in everything I've seen him in, I thought it was all very amateurish, TV-movie sort of level. Sean Penn, who won an Oscar for this - God knows how, gives an overacting masterclass, playing a character that's neither likeable nor particularly dynamic. Perhaps the intention was to create his character as an antihero - unfortunately, I felt nothing towards him, neither positive nor negative. Likewise Bacon's character. Dull as dishwater. There was nothing emotional for me to latch onto, and it seemed Eastwood had to shoehorn and signpost the emotional scenes from overblown direction.
The story is predictable - normally I love mystery films, but here I just wanted the whole thing to be over. It has the feel of a film that tries to be better than it is; the material wasn't there so they tried to ham up the whole thing and try to garner some praise. Well, they got the praise but I don't think it was deserved.
Coming from a fan of Eastwood's work - both acting and directing - I thought this was poor. Not recommended, though others seemed to enjoy it.
Quotes
Dave Boyle: Maybe some day you forget what it's like to be human and maybe then, it's ok.
Sean Devine: So Jimmy, when was the last time you saw Dave?
Jimmy Markum: The last time I saw Dave...
Sean Devine: Yeah, Dave Boyle.
Jimmy Markum: Dave Boyle...
Sean Devine: Yeah Jimmy, Dave Boyle.
Jimmy Markum: That was twenty-five years ago, going up this street, in the back of that car.
Jimmy: We bury our sins here, Dave. We wash them clean.
Trivia
During the scene where Sean Penn's character steps into the morgue where his daughter Katie (Emmy Rossum) is lying on the slate dead, and when he is emotionally promising revenge, Rossum burst into tears, saying that "the scene was so powerful and moving and Sean Penn was so amazing".
In the beginning of the movie when a young Dave is thrown into the backseat of the car, a man in the front seat turns around and flashes his ring - a bishop's ring. The book never indicates that the character was a priest, but it was added to the film since the filming was right in the middle of the priest scandal in the Boston Archdiocese.
The situation at the opening of the movie is based on an incident when, as a child, author Dennis Lehane's mother castigated him for getting into a car with men who claimed to be plainclothes policemen.
Trailer
Director: Clint Eastwood
Cast overview: Sean Penn, Tim Robbins
Running time: 138 minutes
This had all the makings of a film I would like - one of my favourite film figures, Clint Eastwood, behind the camera, alongside a strong cast, an intriguing-sounding mystery from the work of a writer who has had work successfully adapted to the screen elsewhere. Yet I didn't like it. Where do I start?
OK, I found the bit at the very start featuring the kidnapping to be an excellent, chilling, and angering scene. I thought I was in for a great, yet depressing, film. Well, I was half-right. It's depressing, all right, but unfortunately that tends to veer towards the depressingly dull.
Firstly, the acting wasn't fantastic - Robbins aside, who has been excellent in everything I've seen him in, I thought it was all very amateurish, TV-movie sort of level. Sean Penn, who won an Oscar for this - God knows how, gives an overacting masterclass, playing a character that's neither likeable nor particularly dynamic. Perhaps the intention was to create his character as an antihero - unfortunately, I felt nothing towards him, neither positive nor negative. Likewise Bacon's character. Dull as dishwater. There was nothing emotional for me to latch onto, and it seemed Eastwood had to shoehorn and signpost the emotional scenes from overblown direction.
The story is predictable - normally I love mystery films, but here I just wanted the whole thing to be over. It has the feel of a film that tries to be better than it is; the material wasn't there so they tried to ham up the whole thing and try to garner some praise. Well, they got the praise but I don't think it was deserved.
Coming from a fan of Eastwood's work - both acting and directing - I thought this was poor. Not recommended, though others seemed to enjoy it.
Quotes
Dave Boyle: Maybe some day you forget what it's like to be human and maybe then, it's ok.
Sean Devine: So Jimmy, when was the last time you saw Dave?
Jimmy Markum: The last time I saw Dave...
Sean Devine: Yeah, Dave Boyle.
Jimmy Markum: Dave Boyle...
Sean Devine: Yeah Jimmy, Dave Boyle.
Jimmy Markum: That was twenty-five years ago, going up this street, in the back of that car.
Jimmy: We bury our sins here, Dave. We wash them clean.
Trivia
During the scene where Sean Penn's character steps into the morgue where his daughter Katie (Emmy Rossum) is lying on the slate dead, and when he is emotionally promising revenge, Rossum burst into tears, saying that "the scene was so powerful and moving and Sean Penn was so amazing".
In the beginning of the movie when a young Dave is thrown into the backseat of the car, a man in the front seat turns around and flashes his ring - a bishop's ring. The book never indicates that the character was a priest, but it was added to the film since the filming was right in the middle of the priest scandal in the Boston Archdiocese.
The situation at the opening of the movie is based on an incident when, as a child, author Dennis Lehane's mother castigated him for getting into a car with men who claimed to be plainclothes policemen.
Trailer