Last Night In Soho (dir. Edgar Wright)

Started by jacques100, July 15, 2019, 11:06:47 AM

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

Alma

Saw this at the weekend and felt pretty mixed on it.
Spoiler: ShowHide
I thought the first half was really enjoyable, particularly all the 60s stuff; when she emerges to the Thunderball marquee it was such a great moment.

The second half did really fall apart though - one of the issues for me was that the film seemed to reach its crisis point way too early - therefore what felt like the entire second half was Thomasin running around wild-eyed and screaming, which soon lost its tension and meant the film became inert, as well as making some of the character decisions seem inexplicable.

The characters were mostly either very broadly drawn or ciphers - Wright isn't exactly the most subtle director or especially writer and he couldn't really control the second half. Having said that Stamp, Rigg and Tushingham were all really good and it was lovely to see them in the same film.

WorldForgot

Hmmm.

So Wright remains an adoring cinephile making movies that are echoes - so a plot about
Spoiler: ShowHide
a young medium
ought to have been ripe for some Mark Fisher-esque hauntings. Even if it was simply in the allusions and nods. Instead a strong opening characterization never becomes much. Like the script can't decide what to focus on. Blerg.

Its design and production iz fun, and if I'm putting it into context of his previous work it's attempting more than Baby Driver. But as an attempt, its grab bag works aesthetically and not as a screenplay - not if Sandy or Ellie were to really be given their due. As Alma mentions, the supporting characters are beyond flimsy, basically vapor, unfortunately.

And I hated
Spoiler: ShowHide
the johns asking for help, because it hardly makes sense thematically or to Ellie's decision and the movie stops for an entire awkward beat with the once-spooky effects now at a limp standstill.

AntiDumbFrogQuestion

Can we all at least agree that the soundtrack, as in most Wright flicks, was pretty damn good?

WorldForgot

I like it! A handful I'd never heard before.

Loved the
Spoiler: ShowHide
Siouxie and the Banshees
needledrop.

Jeremy Blackman

This was okay. That's about all the passion I can conjure for it.

"Vapor" is good descriptor. Thematically it just dissipates into nothingness. It's like they had a good premise but started shooting before they knew what they wanted to do with it. There's a heartbreaking absence of actual ideas.

Spoiler: ShowHide
The whole final act was like watching the writing process in action. Sandy was a victim, but wait she's a serial killer, but wait she didn't mean for any of it to happen. What?