So I just finished watching The Fall.
I didn’t really have any great expectations of it, because all the director had done previously was The Cell (which I haven’t seen, but I didn’t hear all that great things).
He definitely has a great visual imagination, which I knew beforehand from screenshots of The Fall.
I quite enjoyed it. More than I thought it would. And there was more substance to it than I had anticipated. I thought Tarsem was a purely visual director, a formalist like De Palma. And he is. But he’s not all that bad at telling a story.
It was kind of like a cross between El Topo (relies a lot on symbolism and allegory) and The Princess Bride (a sometimes comical, grand story being told from an adult to a child).
Anyone else seen it?
I’ve seen it a few months ago, and I kept thinking that this movie had so much wasted potential. The whole “It’s just a story” aspect of the movie completely RUINS it for me. The fact that they don’t take anything seriously, and contantly make fun of the story they are telling is BS to me. If this movie had the balls to go for real emotions, melodrama and suspense. It’s a shame really because this movie could have been awesome.
Brian De Palma is more than just a visualist.
[quote=“Col. Crazy Kenneth”]I’ve seen it a few months ago, and I kept thinking that this movie had so much wasted potential. The whole “It’s just a story” aspect of the movie completely RUINS it for me. The fact that they don’t take anything seriously, and contantly make fun of the story they are telling is BS to me. If this movie had the balls to go for real emotions, melodrama and suspense. It’s a shame really because this movie could have been awesome.[/quote]
That actually did annoy me a little. How some things weren’t taken seriously.
[quote=“F.W.”]Brian De Palma is more than just a visualist.[/quote]
I knew that would come off sounding bad. I was thinking of just taking that out.
I didn’t say visualist though. He’s a formalist. As opposed to a humanist. And I don’t mean that in a bad way. And I didn’t mean to compare them like that either. I meant to compare them in the philosophy behind their filmmaking. I love De Palma though. He’s one of my favourites.
[quote=“Angel”][quote=“Col. Crazy Kenneth”]I’ve seen it a few months ago, and I kept thinking that this movie had so much wasted potential. The whole “It’s just a story” aspect of the movie completely RUINS it for me. The fact that they don’t take anything seriously, and contantly make fun of the story they are telling is BS to me. If this movie had the balls to go for real emotions, melodrama and suspense. It’s a shame really because this movie could have been awesome.[/quote]
That actually did annoy me a little. How some things weren’t taken seriously.
[quote=“F.W.”]Brian De Palma is more than just a visualist.[/quote]
I knew that would come off sounding bad. I was thinking of just taking that out.
I didn’t say visualist though. He’s a formalist. As opposed to a humanist. And I don’t mean that in a bad way. And I didn’t mean to compare them like that either. I meant to compare them in the philosophy behind their filmmaking. I love De Palma though. He’s one of my favourites.[/quote]
He better be one of your favorites.
i liked the film…Tarsems movies dont really seem to be about great plots, just great visuals…but you know what, thinking about it…the stories arent too bad…just imagine what he could do with a really good script
[quote=“Movie_Villain”]i liked the film…Tarsems movies dont really seem to be about great plots, just great visuals…but you know what, thinking about it…the stories arent too bad…just imagine what he could do with a really good script[/quote]
The Fall surprised me though. Cause I expected a worse story. Most of my enjoyment of the film is probably just surprise. It does look quite nice though.
People suggest he should be a cinematographer or something, but they forget that cinematographers just make things look beautiful, they don’t create the beautiful locations. I just think he needs to mature a bit more to the point where he can match his imagination with better storytelling technique.