Tell No One / Ne le dis à personne (Guillaume Canet, 2006)

[Murdoch]

I know I'm late in the game and all, but I just finished this and outside of a few good scenes, it was godawful. From the aforementioned U2 song - actually, just about all the music cues were completely ill-timed, made worse by the terrible soundtrack - to the entire second half falling in on itself, I just couldn't see what anybody could get from watching this.

I'm pretty tired right now so I'll just jot down what I hated:

Spoiler

The cliched childhood romance, especially since Alex looked ten years older than Margot.
The constant berating of ridiculous twists that just add to the plot holes - i.e. Margot's dad somehow switching a corpse with Margot's body, Neuville's two thugs being killed by Margot's dad and Neuville never wondering "hey, what happened to those two guys who I hired to kill that girl?" etc. etc. etc.
Plus, Neuville is the supposed villain of the film, and yet he is shown so little and we know so little about him that him getting his comeuppance amounts to a big who cares? All we know is that he somehow controls the DA and police and his son's a pedophile - the former seems like terrible writing used only to tell the audience "Hey, this guy's corrupt!" and the latter being the weak narrative thread that ties him to Alex.
And the film becomes so convoluted at the end that it requires Margot's dad to explain every little piece, I just sat there thinking why did I even watch this if the big reveal amounts to a guy explaining every last detail through a long monologue? I've sat through long monologues before that are simply used to explain what happened previously, but I felt absolutely no engagement with this film so the idea of having to go back over all the ridiculous details gave me a headache.

This is what I get for listening to critics and buying the hype.

[tajmahal]

I know I'm late in the game and all, but I just finished this and outside of a few good scenes, it was godawful. From the aforementioned U2 song - actually, just about all the music cues were completely ill-timed, made worse by the terrible soundtrack - to the entire second half falling in on itself, I just couldn't see what anybody could get from watching this.

I'm pretty tired right now so I'll just jot down what I hated:

Spoiler

The cliched childhood romance, especially since Alex looked ten years older than Margot.
The constant berating of ridiculous twists that just add to the plot holes - i.e. Margot's dad somehow switching a corpse with Margot's body, Neuville's two thugs being killed by Margot's dad and Neuville never wondering "hey, what happened to those two guys who I hired to kill that girl?" etc. etc. etc.
Plus, Neuville is the supposed villain of the film, and yet he is shown so little and we know so little about him that him getting his comeuppance amounts to a big who cares? All we know is that he somehow controls the DA and police and his son's a pedophile - the former seems like terrible writing used only to tell the audience "Hey, this guy's corrupt!" and the latter being the weak narrative thread that ties him to Alex.
And the film becomes so convoluted at the end that it requires Margot's dad to explain every little piece, I just sat there thinking why did I even watch this if the big reveal amounts to a guy explaining every last detail through a long monologue? I've sat through long monologues before that are simply used to explain what happened previously, but I felt absolutely no engagement with this film so the idea of having to go back over all the ridiculous details gave me a headache.

This is what I get for listening to critics and buying the hype.

Ditto to all of the above. The two 'music videos', especially the one involving the character running, and running, and running, were just terrible. Certainly one the most hyped contemporary films I have seen. The ending was ludicrous.

A dog of a film in every way.

[tenia]

I really think both of you didn't fully understand what the movie was really about. Cause if you focused only on the Whodunnit, you missed the whole core of the movie.

[Murdoch]

I really think both of you didn't fully understand what the movie was really about. Cause if you focused only on the Whodunnit, you missed the whole core of the movie.

Which was what?

Spoiler

The underdeveloped pedophilia plot that seemed to be tacked on just to add gravitas to the inept script? Or was it something to do with the barely-there politician who suddenly became the villain of the story despite having so little bearing on the actual plot? Or was it something equally ludicrous?

If the movie was anything more than a whodunnit it failed by focusing so strongly on the twists and mystery than on whatever the hell else you're talking about. I understood it just fine, it just wasn't a good movie.

[tenia]

Wow.

The movie is about a broken-hearted man that can finally have his soulmate back, endangering his life for it.
If you failed to see how much the movie emphasize on this, I can't do anything for you.

I could say some clichés about European sensibility, but I will just stop here for now.

[Murdoch]

I would have empathized with that had their relationship not reeked of Hollywood-style sentimentality, plus there was all that ridiculousness throughout the film, especially in the facile nature of their relationship.

We'll have to agree to disagree.

[wllm995]

This was one of the very best movies I viewed last year!!

[tenia]

I would have empathized with that had their relationship not reeked of Hollywood-style sentimentality, plus there was all that ridiculousness throughout the film, especially in the facile nature of their relationship.

We'll have to agree to disagree.

Yeah, I think we'll disagree.
But I agree ( ^^ ) that their relationship is very naive (hence the childhood flashback, their relationship is still childishly naive), but I took it this way without a problem, when it seems that it stopped you from empathizing.