I'm back! After moving I had to change my cable and Wi-Fi so no Wi-Fi until yesterday night. So hopefully things will return back to normal but I start school again on Monday so no promises. Anyway yesterday I saw One-hundred foot journey, a movie produced by Steven Spielberg, Oprah Winfrey and Helen Mirren as one of the leads. And directed by the guy who made one of my favorite movies "What's eating Gilbert Grape." What could go wrong!
Well.... I didn't like it, I didn't completely hate but I didn't like it. It's not a god awful movie and I cant legitimately call it a bad movie. It's a serviceable movie, it ok but if you wanted something more then you won't get it because theirs not much there.
The film is about the Haji family who after they lose their previous restaurant and the mom dies due to political reasons (I'll get to that later.) They buy a restaurant directly across a restaurant owned by Helen Mirren (one of my favorite actresses and is a badass in anything she does.) And of course chaos ensues but in the end through the love of food they come together.
It's not the most clichéd movie out there (cough *expendables 3* cough), but it is still a by the numbers Oscar bait movie. Yet that isn't the movies biggest problem.
The biggest pet peeves for me was context and time. I typically don't care when a movie takes place and I typically like it better when you can't tell when this movie is taking place. However when you do that the movie has to keep a consistent time frame, this movie is so inconsistent in time that it is extremely distracting. Through some parts of the movie it seems as though it's taking place in either the 60's or the 70's yet in other parts it seems like it takes place in modern day especially in the third act when the main character goes to Paris and it seems like it takes place in 2014. Also the fact that in some cases a year will go by that seems like either a few days or five years. This movie has no sense of time and it's distracting because you shouldn't be focusing on that.
Now that is only time now what about context. Well the whole beginning the mother got killed during a political riot but it comes out of nowhere and is never mentioned again. And I thought it would be considering the fact that their would be some racial tensions coming from the Haji family movie their. That's another thing is that they hand wave the racism that would realistically come up because of this. They mayor mentions some stuff but you never see any of it and it's more tell then show. They do some things with one of Helen Mirren's chefs but he never comes back. This is based on a book and I have never read the book so it might actually bring up a lot of racial problems that would come up no matter what time this movie takes place in.
Like in the where the movie doesn't know when it wants to take place in, the movie has a very inconsistent tone problems. Some scenes it wants to be a serious drama, other scenes it wants to be a borderline comedy and the thing is a movie can be both dramatic and serious (Dramadies) but to me anyway it was really inconsistent.
The biggest problem with the movie though is that to make a reference to the movie is that it's soulless. The movie is mind-numbingly passion-less. None of the actors are bad but they never make a splash with you, even the setting is "ehh" at best and this movie takes place in Paris so it should be goddam beautiful. Again it's not the most clichéd movie ever (cough *book thief* cough) but theirs nothing too it, with "What's eating Gilbert Grape" you could tell the director
Lasse Hallstorm had passion for it and it was something unique and memorable. That's why so many people love Darron Arronofsky, while sometimes he may not make the best movies his movies are all memorable and you can tell with everyone of his movies he has a lot of passion thrown into the movie. I hate to think this but this seems very much a paycheck and "Please-give-me-an-Oscar" movie for Lasse Hallstorm. There is not a thing to this movie you will remember except for maybe some of the food (which looks delicious by the way.) That's why I don't like the movie is because its generic and nothing to it. Give me a bad movie that the director had a lot of passion for over an ok, technically better movie where nobody wanted to be their or had any passion for.
I didn't not go into this movie wanting to hate it I went into this movie wanting to love it because it was done by the guy who made one of my favorite movies of all time and has Helen Mirren as one of it's leads. I expected better from this movie.
I give it a 5/10- serviceable but forgettable.
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