I really wanted to like this film. Everything suggested that it would be a slow-burning move to understanding how the world in England was about to change permanently as Britain's already tenuous place in Europe was suddenly under the rule of Thatcher...with a good line-up of music, and a Wim Wenders connection, what could go wrong?
Well, everything went wrong. Filmed in black and white, it misses the whole colorful scene that was England in 1979. The music included too much German stuff - yes, we listened to Kraftwerk, but German culture all over the place? Not in 1979.
Mainly though, it's incoherent. Nothing hangs together. The protagonist is cold and distant, and everyone talks as though they are in a Harold Pinter play. There's not much road for a road movie, and the highlights of the movie are NOT when Sting is involved but rather the scene with the Glaswegian squaddie talking about his time in Northern Ireland, and..and...actually, that may be the highlight, which luckily happened earlier on...or not, because at that point I thought the film was still going to be OK.
I guess the photography is OK, if you like art student pretentiousness. The black and white doesn't help either.
This just may be the most disappointing movie that I've ever seen.
Well, everything went wrong. Filmed in black and white, it misses the whole colorful scene that was England in 1979. The music included too much German stuff - yes, we listened to Kraftwerk, but German culture all over the place? Not in 1979.
Mainly though, it's incoherent. Nothing hangs together. The protagonist is cold and distant, and everyone talks as though they are in a Harold Pinter play. There's not much road for a road movie, and the highlights of the movie are NOT when Sting is involved but rather the scene with the Glaswegian squaddie talking about his time in Northern Ireland, and..and...actually, that may be the highlight, which luckily happened earlier on...or not, because at that point I thought the film was still going to be OK.
I guess the photography is OK, if you like art student pretentiousness. The black and white doesn't help either.
This just may be the most disappointing movie that I've ever seen.