For a duration I gave rest to series and shifted to movies. Picked movies either based on recommendation or boldly venturing based on what the INFO says. Lesson/takeaway: it is mediocrity by the numbers. My hit rate is 20% – one out of 5. Unknown Saint is the only one that crossed over the threshold and is miles ahead of the other movies in the list. Sweet Girl comes next. Rest of the movies, Beckett, Lost Bullet, and SAS, degrade from mediocre to worst in that order – you are better off with Terminator 1 & 2, Mad max: Fury Road, Baby Driver, Ronin, Speed, The Hard Target or any Jackie Chan movies, even if you are watching it for umpteenth time.
Unknown Saint
Official Trailer:
This is sleeper hit of the lot. A sweet, beautiful movie. A thief digs a grave and buries his loot in a mound before he gets caught by the cops. By the time he comes back from jail, a structure has come up in the same place as the tomb for unknown saint. Whether the thief succeeded in getting back his loot forms the rest of the story. It is a sleepy little village where nothing much happens. Life is slow, people are slow. Lingering shots, few additional seconds, captures the essence of the lifestyle. Pacing is good and well etched characters captivates us. Nurse and the doctor characters so memorably written – they cracked me up whenever they came on screen. Movie offers something fresh and new – a barber who also makes gold teeth, the shrine guard and his dog, farmer and his son, clinic as a hangout place for the villagers, doctor performing a surgery on the dog. These characters add flavour to the heist theme. There is also the angle of belief and faith. While few are advantaged by the Unknown Saint’s shrine, the guard for example, few are not happy with it, like the farmer who thinks the villagers are worshipping a false god. Fresh narrative style, the simplicity, performances, and subtle messages makes this movie a rewarding watch and a wonderful piece of cinema.
Sweet Girl
Official Trailer:
A revenge saga. What makes the movie engaging is the pacing, performances, father-daughter moments, action sets, and the twist towards the end. I didn’t see it coming. There are few cliched plot twists, but not a deal breaker. Of course, after few weeks / months, we will recollect only the twist, rest will vaporize from our memory. Unlike T1, T2, or Mad Max: Fury Road don’t think we will get an inkling to watch it again.
Beckett
Official Trailer:
An interesting premise – protagonist lost in a new place, not familiar with the language, loses his wife, and doesn’t know why cops are after him. I liked the narrative technique; we unravel the mystery in bits and pieces as the protagonist. The mystery is not fully explained, we do get to know it is about a political kidnap and a conspiracy but not enough insight to hold our interest. Around 50% into the movie, story loses steam. Convenient coincidences give a ho-hum feeling. Lack of action set pieces, pacing, and unengaging conspiracy plot works against the movie.
Lost Bullet
Official Trailer:
After the initial opening sequence, and the prison escape (well done) scene my brain stopped registering any events that happened on the screen. Is that a garage or a police station? Of course, protagonist, the good guy survives, the bad guy gets killed, and good trumps over evil. So, all is well.
SAS
Official Trailer:
Worst of the lot. Actors move around seriously as if they have severe constipation, and spout cliched dialogues. There is something about a village, a video clip, oil pipeline, corporate and political criminals. I guess they came up with one line narrative, what if the train is hijacked in English Tunnel, and stopped at that, immediately went to the floor filling the spaces with cliched tropes, twists and action sequences. There is a talk of tunnel is blocked but people keep moving in and out and there is no sense of location / geography. To give credit where it is due, production quality is good…. only if they have used some of that money to get good writers.