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MonMaire
Reviews
Boston Strangler (2023)
Weirdly paced, almost feels like watching a documentary with "bold takes"
I get it, it's based on real events. The problem is that most people are familiar with at least a general knowledge of how the story went, and the screenplay is structured in this weirdly paced and spaced out way that makes it feels like the the film needs to cover historical fact number 1, wink at the audience, clock in, clock out and move on every five minutes in the flattest way possible. It's supposed to be a thriller, but there is hardly any suspense and no climactic points whatsoever, nothing. It's fact, after fact, after fact, and it falls flat every time.
Loretta's storyline was interesting for the first part of the film, but soon enough she starts to be pushed forward by the flow of events and looses almost all agency, it's always a phone call that moves things forward and it starts to get pretty repetitive pretty soon. Her home life isn't that interesting either, as the character doesn't seem to be particularly invested in it, so why should the audience.
The ending felt unearned and packed with patted dialogue and a little too on the nose and preachy for my taste. To be fair, had I not been interested in the real course of events, I would have probably never bothered finishing it, but then again it's kind of obvious this is exactly what they were betting on in the first place.
That said, no blame on the actors who I think did overall the best they could with what they were given, and if someone weren't already familiar with the story, I'd still recommend this over the 1968 film.
Grace Harte (2017)
Refreshing, it exceeded my expectations
Finally a nice breath of fresh air from TG4! As much as I have enjoyed Ros na Rún it was about time we moved forward. The story itself is more layered than it appears to be. I particularly appreciated Dara Devaney in the role of the husband.
Worth watching, in my opinion.
The Song of Wandering Aengus (2017)
A nice short
Liam Cunningham's voice delivers a perfectly magical, almost eerie tribute to W.B. Yeats' poem.
The animation, surely artistic and visionary, looks a bit underdeveloped (considering it came out in 2017), but it's probably been designed that way on purpose.
Nothing special to be fair, but likable enough.