| I saw it a couple weeks ago. It was OK, good cinematography. Great
makeup on Joan Chen -- she started out unattractive and then went
downhill from there. Oliver Stone showed the VC to be as bad as the
American troops, which was probably true.
The movie suffers a bit from being long (~2:30) and Stone's heavy-
handed approach -- he wants to make sure EVERYBODY gets his point.
(Simple, non-spoiler example: Vietnamese girl comes to America and
the first time she sees a refrigerator it's not one like most Americans
have, nooo, it's a double-wide behemoth just stuffed chock full of
food and frills, the camera down on the floor looking up so as to make
it even more imposing. C'mon Oliver, trust your audience more!)
John
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| Funnily enough, the kitchen/refrigerator scene was one of the few I
enjoyed. I agree that it was overdone, but at least it made its point
without that damned voiceover. Listening to the (seemingly) ever
present narration drove me nuts. It was like watching an illustrated
reading of the book and not a story told visually: scenes galloped along
one after the other and the only way to know what was happening was to
listen to the narration. Just watching and listening to the actors wasn't
enough.
I ended up with the impression that there was so much plot to cram in
that the only way to make sure it was all included (in that running
time) was to add the voiceover. I wish he'd gone for three hours and
let everybody 'breathe' a little more. If the story's good enough (and
this one was) three hours is nothing. Look at "Dances With Wolves".
It did look stunning, though.
Nick
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|
Finally saw this (on video) for the first time last night, and I have
to say I share share the criticism levelled in the previous notes...too
long, too obvious, and too much narration (hell, the only thing I
*wasn't* tired of after 2.5 hours was the superb photography!)
Don't get me wrong, it had one or two other positive features. However,
I could understand an American getting pretty irritable at the
over-simplistic view of the States portrayed in the second half of the
film: beautiful, simple Asian girl unable to come to terms with
overwhelming power of American capitalism (represented by overstocked
fridge and overweight sister-in-law). What's more, I sat through the
whole film without once really experiencing the horror and dread one
normally associates with the Vietnam war; too many clean, well-shaven
soldiers intent purely on getting their oats for my liking!
Then again, I've never been much of an Oliver Stone fan anyway, and
many people have told me that, by contrast, the book's well worth a read.
Dom
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