MovieChat Forums > Loft (2008) Discussion > 20 minutes too long

20 minutes too long

posted 16 years ago by LaundroMat
21 replies | jump to latest

Spoilers ahead.

I have the feeling the movie would have been so much better had it ended with the character played by Peeters being locked up by his friends' betrayal.

Everything that came after that felt as if it was attached to the screenplay at a later stage, thereby muddying the core plot and themes. The final scene even felt as if it was made only to cater to audience reactions gathered during previews.

The plot became too convoluted near the end (although some scenes were unnecessarily repeated multiple times, as if the audience were imbeciles), which finally dampened the effectiveness of the movie.

[–] Adeir 16 years ago

I can understand where this is coming from (pretty much every movie lately seems too long), but not all people pay that much attention and can certainly benefit from the small recaps. I know I did. :)

True, it got a bit too convoluted at the end, but that's just a minor annoyance, to me.

[–] damien-16 16 years ago

Stylistically it is very well made. But the plot is overdone. It's too much showing off: look how clever I am. And when the film finally ends after 2 or 3 false endings, it's no ending at all. They might as easily have added another appendix, or rather a non sequitur for that matter.

[–] Dramonium 16 years ago

I don't consider it to be a that much the screenplay's fault, but more the fault of the actor playing the eventual villain. His role and lines offered and required far more than what he delivered. In the obvious exposition scene he didn't seem to be the maniacally in love, extremely frustrated killer at all. The ending was one of the most important scenes in the movie, the climax where the build-up of tension from the entire movie had to explode into the theater. It was the moment for the actor to shine, to show his full potential, to be a marvelously twisted villain, to be the John Doe from Se7en, the Hannibal Lecter... But his performance was far too modest for such an extremely stylized, high tension thriller. Were his performance up to par, noone would've complained about the ending being obsolete.

[–] Panterken 16 years ago

"The ending was one of the most important scenes in the movie, the climax where the build-up of tension from the entire movie had to explode into the theater. It was the moment for the actor to shine, to show his full potential, to be a marvelously twisted villain, to be the John Doe from Se7en, the Hannibal Lecter..."

Expecting Bruno Vanden Broucke to be able to equal a performance by Spacey or Hopkins is as overdemanding as wanting 'Loft' to be as brilliant as 'The Usual Suspects' or 'Memento'.

I'm not denying he didn't fully display the insanity the script demanded of him, I'm simply pointing out there's no Belgian actor who could pull this off like Spacey, Hopkins, etc. did.

...I am lost, I'm no guide, but I'm by your side...

[–] Mrswing 16 years ago

Aaaaaaand we have a spoiler!!!
Haven't seen the movie yet but from the very short opening clip, I already suspected it would turn out to be VDB - just because he's the least likely candidate. Man, I'm good.

[–] Panterken 16 years ago

well, from the topic title it's pretty obvious we were gonna discuss the ending...but I'm gonna edit my previous post with spoiler tags.

...I am lost, I'm no guide, but I'm by your side...

[–] Imthemanonthesilvermountain 16 years ago

So, the real killer is that guy from "het eiland"?

OMG.

I haven't seen it yet, next weekend probably. I just hope it's not overhyped.

You don't have to worry about me

[–] atomiumjan 16 years ago

before you start reading this... my comment has got a lot of spoilers!!!
so stop reading now if you don't want to know the plot.
Okey...

Here I go...

with the spoilers...

and my problem with this film.

I love the film, I love the style, the acting, the music, the editing, the dialogue... But WHAT A HUGE PLOT-hole.
For the record, I saw it twice, and can someone give me an answer to this question:
Why do they have to stage the scène to make it look like a suicide when they already think it is a suicide??? I understand that the cut wrists of the dead woman are perfect to make everybody react surprised when they see the dead body but what was the plan? What had to be staged? They just had to put Filip Peeters next to the body so it looked he was there while she commited suicide?
And why did they have to find an alibi if they would come back to the place afterwards? And why did the actual perpetrator made a call to on estate agent?!?

If someone can give me straight simple answers to this questions, I would be glad. :-)

[–] Kuifer 16 years ago

They wanted Vincent to believe she'd been murdered. They wanted to teach him a lesson.

[–] atomiumjan 16 years ago

Well, that's a great answer to my question. Thanks :-)
And how about the alibi's (for wich moments exactly are they looking for an alibi?) and the call to the estate agent?

[–] atomiumjan 16 years ago

And another question. If they want it to look like murder. Why are they surprised at the end when Vincent is accused for murder?

[–] Mrj1984 15 years ago

They actually didn't want it to be a murder, but the crazy guy, Filip cut her up when he said that he was going to "sort out the scene".
That was why they were asking him how come there was so much blood and that is why they were shocked when Vincent was being charged with murder...

[–] simplyfsl 14 years ago

Well , its quite complex, they wanted to look it as a suicide to the Police for which they also kept the note beside her, but they wanted Stevens to be baffled that it is a murder until it is proved he was really there last night which Chris wanted surety of.

Surely they were surprised as Steven was charged for murder as they didn't know suicide note had been taken away which is really made clear at the end..

Why so Serious ?

[–] zoso-rh 15 years ago

Also, Chris said that he wanted to know for sure that Vincent was with the woman the night before, that HE was the man that made a woman kill herself. I can see why that would be important to him since he's a psychiatrist.

Chris told that he would give a sign when he would go through with it. He said that he would break something or something like that. The only thing Filip had to do was to make it look like they both attempted suicide(with the handcoughs and *beep*, die side by side), but he had obviously overdone that a bit. ^^

[–] dnnn1 12 years ago

Why do they have to stage the scène to make it look like a suicide when they already think it is a suicide???

The "over-the-top" detail is mentioned in the film; That the coke-sniffer has added :-)
The cutting makes the plot development possible where the slitting of wrists did the killing 'after all'.

The movie made me think of 'Usual Suspects' half-way. One turn 'too much', i thought, - untill they added a few more LOL.
- So - That is not the point.

Seymore Hoffman was needed as the bad guy :-)
But watch the 2010 version of how you can do it WORSE!

[–] Kuifer 16 years ago

*spoilers*

I had the exact same feeling when I left the cinema. I too felt the last 20 minutes were unnecessary.
I think it would have been perfect to end the movie with Chris (Koen De Bauw) realising his brother actually killed her. I like open endings. Maybe they could have included a flashback indicating Luc (VDB) planned it all, but that's about it.

[–] atomiumjan 16 years ago

*spoilers*

When I think about it longer. It's not true, they are not trying to make it look like murder. And if they are, the film contains even more plotholes when you think about it. The problem with this film is, the first time you see it, you love it. I wanted to see it again. But it's not getting better. My first rating to the film was 8/10, now it's 7/10. But I think I'm gonna change it to 6/10. Pitty. But I still love the looks, style, directing, music, editing and acting. But the script is, when you see it more then once, just bad.

[–] zoso-rh 15 years ago

I thought the script was great, maybe a tad overdone. But you should know that this was the first script Bart De Pauw wrote for a movie, which makes a tad more impressive to me. Certainly it's not a factor in rating this movie for most people but I think he deserves a hard 8 for his first script and the directing and the score and such, deserve a hard 9.

[–] simplyfsl 14 years ago

If it would have been shorter , there would have been a thread that movie sucked due to lack of clarity and character development, as for the continuous repetition of scenes, well its not overdone like Hollywood movies where everything is spoon fed, I think the length and pace are well balanced in this movie though it is not USUAL SUSPECTS , still a very thrilling and nail biting ride with a nice ending..

Why so Serious ?

[–] Valmighty 13 years ago

Agreed, it should've ended when the police told Chris that Sandra hasn't been already dead.

[–] reichen4eva (252) 5 years ago

I found the "final act" of the film to be the weakest and as you said convoluted. Luc suddenly falling head of heels for Dusseldorf girl he only met for 5 seconds and then trying to kill her is a little unrealistic. I felt like the director wanted some "shock twist" and fell a little flat for me. Honestly i would preferred an open ending with Peters getting booked, but later found she was still alive, leading Chris to realise his brother to be the "accidental" cause of her murder. And then the film ending. Still enjoyed the film, despite its faults.