"AestheticsInMotion" (aestheticsinmotion)
10/09/2020 at 22:33 • Filed to: None
1
5|
"AestheticsInMotion" (aestheticsinmotion)
10/09/2020 at 22:33 • Filed to: None | 1
| 5 |
This is a long film. Not “Return of the King uncut edition” levels , but still long. Add in a slow start to what is best described as a slow burn of a movie, and The Devil All the Time feels like quite a slog throughout much of it’s 140 minute runtime.
Tom Holland—who we’re introduced to almost an hour in — stars as a young man “ devoted to protecting his loved ones in a town full of corruption and sinister characters” (IMDB)
Unfortunately that single sentance seems to be about as much thought as was given to the story . Throughout the entire movie I couldn’t help but feel as if one day t he writers were spit- balling ideas, came up with one that had some merit, and then proceeded to immediately jump straight to casting—all thoughts of “plot”, and “cohesive storytelling” be damned.
Take a sitcom episode based solely off of hitting punchline after punchline. While that may work great for a twenty minute animated cartoon, it makes for a less than pleasing experience when translated t o a 2+ hour drama.
With multiple character arcs reminiscent of Sin City or Pulp Fiction—it was all the more disappointing when none of them coalesced. If I wanted two hours of silence interspersed with short bursts of intense violence I could strap a gopro to a police officer. Yes, things would happen, but would it form a story.. ?
The saving grace here was Robert Pattinson. The sparkly vampire of old absolutely robbed Tom Holland of the spotlight, completely taking over in every second of his much-too-short screen time. That’s no knock on Holland, who delivered a fantastic performance. In fact, every member of the cast put together a strong showing, which just makes it all the more impressive that Pattinson was able to stand so far above the rest.
I watched the first half of this movie, and drifted off to sleep. Three days later, I convinced two friends to watch it with me from the start where I finally m ade it through to the end. One of the two friends had gone online to read through the entire plot after quickly losing interest, and the other was similarly un- engaged not long after.
If for nothing else, The Devil All the Time is worth watchi ng to see Robert Pattinson’s chilling preacher in action.
6 /10
flatisflat
> AestheticsInMotion
10/09/2020 at 22:50 |
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Having not seen it myself, I can’t weigh-in in an informed manner, but generally speaking, ‘ slow-burner’ films have that difficult task of incorporating tension and drama and ‘action’ yet all to a degree that must remain consistent with its overall ‘slow-burner’ character.
The good ones will keep you alert for the details and the nuances throughout, but alas that is so much harder to pull off.
The bad ones interject moments of too much intensity which then creates that sort of ‘fixed point’ in the progression of the film and can upset its rhythm, which can create a range of cohesion issues. It sounds like this film falls more into this latter category.
PowderHound
> AestheticsInMotion
10/09/2020 at 22:56 |
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One of my housemates was watching it so I caught it maybe halfway through, grabbed some quick details and really enjoyed what I saw of it. Never realized how much of it I missed and probably for the better by the sounds of it
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AestheticsInMotion
> PowderHound
10/09/2020 at 23:06 |
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The funny thing is, if the movie had started 40 minutes in you likely wouldn't even know you were missing anything. There were some powerful scenes early on, but the entire first act could have easily been replaced by 3 minutes of narration. Especially since they did voice overs already
MarquetteLa
> AestheticsInMotion
10/10/2020 at 01:45 |
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The only clip I’ve seen of this movie is one of Robert Pattinson’s utterly atrocious “southern” accent. No thanks.
Ssfancyfresh
> AestheticsInMotion
10/10/2020 at 07:13 |
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It felt like 4 hours of misery porn. Not what I wanted.