This is one of those “one of a kind” and “they don’t make them like these anymore” kind of movies. It may be due to the film’s setting, but the way that the movie weaves in this fantasy story that was once popular back in the old days of filmmaking is so timeless that it remains as enjoyable as it was intended.
Roy (Lee Pace) is a young man in a hospital in the 1920s with a serious injury. One day he ends up meeting Alexandria (Catinca Untaru), a young girl also in the hospital with an injury, and befriends her by telling her this fantastical tale of these five bandits who’re on a quest for revenge.
I personally enjoy these kinds of movies because it reminds me what it is I truly love about films. Most people will look at the movie and fall in love with the visuals that Tarsem Singh presented us while in the fantastical story of The Black Bandit and his followers, which I do not deny being amazing. However, I found myself becoming more and more attached with the reality of the story. I was hearing the story that Roy was telling the child and using the information that the film presented to me step by step about Roy I was able to find out more about the character of Roy and how everything we’re shown from the very first frame ties into the character of Roy.
While this movie was intentional, in every sense of the word, in giving great character depth for people like me to enjoy, why is it that I latch onto the sad part of the story rather than live in this world of fantasy and wonderful beauty. I prefer to pay attention to the depressing reality of this man suffering in his pain and trying to trick this little girl into helping him “go to sleep”, as he likes to put it. It’s the sad brilliance of this world, it’s a man having put it all on the line and not made it, the emotions that Pace exudes throughout the film is so vast that he saves the film from being just another silly children’s story.
I think what bothers me the most about Singh’s film as I think about it more and more is that while I don’t doubt his artistic talent when it comes to design, I think that this film doesn’t quite show that he has the photographic skills that filmmakers like Martin Scorsese, David Fincher or even Bryan Singer has shown us in the last few years. There were moments, like the opening scene, where he gave me a glimpse into his artistic nature, but at the end of the day just because your design is superior it doesn’t make you a superior filmmaker.
When the film came to its eventual conclusion I somehow found myself refiguring my ridiculous belief about silent films. I’ve had an odd aversion to silent films as I believe a lot of them, or at least a lot of the ones I’ve seen, are so far distanced from how society is today that a lot of the portrayals of characters always seem a bit unbearable. The comedy remains completely over the top and the drama is always a bit too poorly put forward at times. I don’t doubt that in 1928 the films of that year didn’t resonate with its audience in the same way that films like The Fighter and True Grit does with us today, but at the same time it doesn’t mean that I’m going to be able to tap into that reaction watching those films for the first time now.