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MovieMeditation presents...
HIS FILM DIARY 2015
total movie count ........... viewing day count
226 .......................... 260
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September 17th
—— 2014 ——
BOULEVARD
—— drama ——
It's never too late
to make a U-turn
I was sitting in anxious anticipation once I pressed play and prepared myself for a trip down memory lane on a boulevard of broken hearts. The movie 'Boulevard' had the potential to be a minor memorial masterpiece for Robin Williams' dramatic force, even though I questioned whether or not it would come that far. But I have always loved and admired Robin when he turns to more downplayed drama, since he seems to show a humane and honest personality beyond his acting – a personality that almost pierce you for being too authentic to be acting alone. Whatever the case might be, I was very much looking forward to watching Mr. Williams in a final and hopefully fantastic performance...
Unfortunately, this movie is a forgettable failure, which I definitely don’t want to remember the iconic actor by – especially considering how heavy-handed the subject matter appears and how uneven the approach is. Robin Williams fits the bill alright, but only so he can cash a paycheck with it. His role in the movie is so terribly typecast that it is almost torturous to watch and in a way it almost feels like an insult to the talents of Mr. Williams. It makes me both angry and sad to see Robin in a role where he feels so used and humiliated, which may be the point of his character, but not for the actor. I don’t know if I even make sense here, but seeing how the film doesn't give its actors much to work with, it ends up being an irritatingly dull and dragged out lullaby talking its own miserable self to sleep.
In the story we meet Robin's character; a man who is living a monotonous and repetitive life, only to suddenly take a turn that will change his life forever. But my problem with this simple set-up is that the story is never actually set-up. We skip way too easily over the character's motivations to change and past concerns about wanting to change, which makes the eventual change seem odd and out of place. I guess you could make out some kind of reasoning for wanting to change – boring job, boring wife, boring life – but you never see him consider leaving what he already has. We get a glimpse of his daily routine, but there is no build up or visual representation of a man thinking and worrying about his life. He simply goes out and does it, from one day to the other… just like that.
And what he eventually seeks out is a secretive and very personal thing, which you may want to keep to yourself in real life, but in a movie it won’t work properly if you don’t introduce and develop it properly. There are two ways to accomplish this; either it has to gradually evolve from the very beginning or it has to be delivered directly and in a daring and confident way. But ‘Boulevard’ is an empty road that takes you nowhere. It doesn’t drive towards anything new and exciting and it doesn't really evolve or follow through with its plot or characters. It mainly works as this weird mid-ground of a movie – one of those small independent movies, which you pass for a movie but praise for very little. It is an empty and predictable affair and though Williams is good he mostly delivers a performance on autopilot, which is as good as you can make it out of his paper-thin and pathetic character. This U-turn was definitely more of a step back than a throwback, unfortunately, and what could have been a trip down memory lane ultimately became a tripping down the mediocre same-same. What a shame.
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Last edited by MovieMeditation; 03-09-16 at 04:51 PM.
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