One Hour Photo
So I went out to dinner with a friend of mine in Manhattan then I decided to see a movie. I had my heart set on Pluto Nash. I thought at least it would be a funny review to write and I wanted to see the toilet swirl of $90 million dollars. But then I saw One Hour Photo was playing and I came to my senses and decided to go with that. I'm not really sure I made the right choice.
I had 'one hour' to kill so I wandered around in Union Square and sat on a bench for a while. I observed the other bench sitters and the people walking. I read the paper and drank water. It was nice.
Anyway, I felt like I knew pretty much what to expect from this flick (photo guy gets overly involved with a family thru their photos and goes psycho. done and done.). I don't think that's a spoiler. But what I didn't expect was the movie to be so heavy and heavy handed.
The opening credits were kind of fun and disturby with a quiet flashbulb pop lighting the letters and I got kind of psyched for a coolio creepya-out. But that wore off real fast once Mork came on screen. Mork plays a clerk in like K-Mart type place and you can tell he's a bizarro. Quiet spoken. Dropping hints of his craziness now and then with a too-close-for-comfort comments. Most people would run for the hills if their photo developer guy made comments about 'how nice your family looks'. Nobody wants to believe that photo guys even look at the pictures let alone want to discuss em with them. But dingbat wife in this movie (who I didn't recognize but she looked like a pretty Olive Oyl with Japanese grrlband hair) seemed to think he was just a nice guy. He's Sy, the Photo Guy! Blah blah blah. Check out how obsessed he is! Blah blah blah. Totally whatever.
Visually the movie visually was washed out. Muted pastley colors. All artificial and stuff. At first I dug it cause it was a 'new' look but then after a while it was annoying. Mork's clothes matched every room he was in like a chameleon (cheap trick to get us to realize he's wallpapery. annoying. heavy handed.) There were tons of closeups of Mork's face all spacing out and stuff. (i get it. i get it already! he's mental! got it!) The movie did work on certain levels tapping into his utter loneliness and societal fringe status but... it was still whatever.
There were a few very cool shots. But ironically I would have been happier looking at the cool shots as actual photographs rather than sifting through this flick. I felt it really tried to ease its way under my skin, but it really just washed over me leaving behind a clammyness that I could have done without.
Three Good Things About This Movie
- I very much dug the idea of going into the inner world of an everyday guy
who usually goes unnoticed.
- The director guy did hit on a few great visuals. (look for parking garage,
eyeballs, and long aisle shot like wings.)
- Lumberg from Office Space had a part in it.
Three Bad Things About This Movie
- Depressing character, in a depressing movie, shot in a depressing way.
- Enough is enough with Mork. Start casting some older actors that haven't
gotten a big break yet.
- I found this movie to be lacking in subtlety. And great creepy is all in
the tone of the subtle. This was pretend subtle.
All in all this movie is definitely a video rental (if that). I found it to be boring and the ending wasn't jolty enough. I hope this doesn't make the movie gods shy away from making more creepy movies about your local people. I think in reality we've all probably at some point shaken the hand of a complete psychopath. We just didn't know it. Follow that guy for me. Don't follow Mork in a store vest and try to wow me with fancy camera tricks.