So, I went to say 3
Days To Kill today with my family. I am not a Kevin
Costner fan, but this was pretty good.
It's interesting to see, though, how
much Luc Besson's
experiences as a French director and writer influenced the way the
movie was told.
First, it is a fairly complex movie.
Not technically, but dramatically. It's not a movie about figuring
out what's going on, or a complex heist or con movie where nothing is
what it seems. Everything in this movie is exactly what it seems.
The complexity arises from a much more believable and everyday
source. Costner's character finds himself in a situation where he
has to balance a number of different requirements on his life.
Where I see the European influences in
Besson's work is in the way that he uses the different visual,
character and emotional beats. They are mostly slower and longer
than an American director or writer would make them, and lead to a
somewhat looser feel than one might expect from the basic synopsis of
the movie (here's
the link at IMDB if you like spoilers).
In a less complex movie (say, without
one of the major threads), that pacing would have worked quite well.
As it was, the movie was about 20 minutes too long, and too many of
the beats go on just long enough to lose their impact slightly.
But that's my take on it. I am fairly
certain that someone raised on European
cinema would feel differently. And someone raised on Bollywod
different still.
It is really fascinating to see someone
like Besson do so many different things (remember The
Fifth Element?) while coming from such a complex history in his
various fields. I look forward to seeing more from Besson, just to
see what he decides to do and how he does it.
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