GATTACA (PG-13)
Review by E. Benjamin Kelsey
Rating: * * * (out of 4)
I admit that I was very excited to see "Gattaca", and perhaps my expectations influenced my feelings about the film, either good or bad. I think this is probably common thing that happens to movie critics. The premise for this movie really intrigued me, and I've been anxious to see it ever since I saw my first preview for it a few months ago.
The point is, I quite liked this film. I battled with myself over whether it deserved more than 3 stars, but to be completely honest, it probably doesn't deserve more. DESERVE being the main factor.
The plot for "Gattaca" is very intriguing though. The issues it brings up, even by themselves, made this film so noteworthy. Sure, some people will argue that similar things have indeed been done, but I still found this film to be very magnetizing. The main problem here is the lack of character development. I didn't find the stoic-ness of the actors to be quite as negative as many critics seemed to. I think their lack of emotional depth was all part of the story; part of what it was trying to say about the future. Still, the characters did need more attention, and perhaps their "true feelings" should have been buried deep down, stiffled, but making themselves known here and there. Instead, the people just seemd to be void of emotions. That may work for what the movie is trying to say, but when it comes to some of the central characters, we needed more to draw us in.
The opening visuals were great. Nothing profound, but still, near microscopic images of falling fingernails, hairs, and skin cells were very well done. Nice imagery to start out the film.
There were also a few problems with the plot besides character development. Some unanswered questions remained at the films end. Subtle continuities were passed over, but probably nothing to worry about. Other things, however, just seemed too simple or too implausable within the futuristic setting. "If they can do this in the future, how come they can't do this?" Those are the kinds of things that went thru my mind.
This review sounds harsh and negative, but I do want to stress that I quite enjoyed the film and I would definitely recommend it. I think that all my "ranting and raving" was more to help myself feel at peace for not giving it a higher grade. That's how much I liked it. This is one of those films where I have to remind myself that QUALITY and ENJOYABILITY are not quite the same. Still, this is definitely a worthy effort!
The review above was posted to the
rec.arts.movies.reviews newsgroup (de.rec.film.kritiken for German reviews).
The Internet Movie Database accepts no responsibility for the contents of the
review and has no editorial control. Unless stated otherwise, the copyright
belongs to the author.
Please direct comments/criticisms of the review to relevant newsgroups.
Broken URLs inthe reviews are the responsibility of the author.
The formatting of the review is likely to differ from the original due
to ASCII to HTML conversion.
Related links: index of all rec.arts.movies.reviews reviews