Saturday, August 31, 2013

Review: A Serbian Film (Uncut)

I will not sugarcoat it on this one, this is by far the most grotesque, deranged, and traumatic film I have ever seen in terms of visuals. But will the story keep up with it's violence? Find out my reaction below.




Synopsis:
Milos, a retired porn star, leads a normal family life with his wife Maria and six-year old son Petar in tumultuous Serbia, trying to make ends meet. A sudden call from his former colleague Layla will change everything. Aware of his financial problems, Layla introduces Milos to Vukmir - a mysterious, menacing and politically powerful figure in the pornographic business. A leading role in Vukmir's production will provide financial support to Milos and his family for the rest of their lives. A contract insists on his absolute unawareness of a script they will shoot. From then on, Milos is drawn into a maelstrom of unbelievable cruelty and mayhem devised by his employer, "the director" of his destiny. Vukmir and his cohorts will stop at nothing to complete his vision. In order to escape the living cinematic hell he's put into, and save his family's life, Milos will have to sacrifice everything - his pride, his morality, his sanity, and maybe even his own life. -- (C) Invincible Pictures

Story:
Honestly, it was pretty generic, on the surface, the film is all about a Dad who wants to make out the best for his family but underneath that surface comes the horrendous appearance of this movie. Sure the formula is the same as most most movies today but it is different when it comes to it's execution and result.

Basically, the story of this movie is like an exaggerated metaphor in the dark corners of the porn industry. This idea sounds very good but the execution is not very good, it just relied too much on it's grotesque nature which at the end became a little exhausting and this is my biggest complaint in the movie.

Acting:
There are some few things that I liked in this movie and one of them is probably the acting and there is only one guy who made a remarkable performance and it was Milos played by Srdjan Todorovic. He was really good in the role and felt like a perfect match, he was able to channel emotions that is pretty hard for actors but what I liked most in his performance is that in just a snap of a finger the guy can instantly change emotions, it was brilliant.

As for the supporting characters, they were just annoying and irritating and for most of the time I didn't care enough for them.

Violence:
This film is surely the most vile, grotesque and one of the most shocking films I've ever seen in my life. For some reason. I think that this was purely made to show how gross a movie can be and not how good their idea really is.

Having said that, going back to the violence, at some point, the prosthetic became a bit obvious and pulls you out of the realistic nature of it.

Cinematography:
This is the other thing that I liked in this movie. It was gritty and dark which works with the tone of the movie because this aspect added depth to scenes and made the scenes seems a bit more gnarly than it already is.

Direction:
In all honesty, it was plain boring, the only good thing about his direction is that he was able to let his lead actor to showcase a great performance in a mediocre movie.

Overall:
A dark and grimy movie which really has no substance. This movie could have been a lot greater with a better story structure and less of the gruesome nature. That said though, Srdjan Todorovic and the cinematography was the only thing striking in this dull movie.

Grade:


Favorite line:
Vukmir: That's it, Milos. That's the cinema. That's film!

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