MovieChat Forums > Nocturnal Animals (2016) Discussion > So disappointed.

So disappointed.

posted 8 years ago by fn-sj
4 replies | jump to latest

I never thought I'd say this being a huge Tom Ford fan after devouring A Single Man...but I felt thete were too many weaknesses in this movie.

Maybe it's the results of reading too many reviews before I watched it but I felt that the present day thread of the story was thin and Amy Adams, as good as she can be, undersold the whole story...but then is that the fault of Ford's direction.

The metaphor/allegory of the book was too vague although the intention was clear but it didn't give anything to hang it's hat on. These sequence were the strongest in the movie and, as someone else has suggested on this board, could have survived as the whole body of the movie without the present day section.

It's hard to equate exactly caused that sense of something missing but there was. It's a strong visual experience as always with Ford's style emphasis but even that was played out in very obvious ways which, I think, we're too stark compared with the amiguities of the rest of the movie.

The title of the original novel is Tony ans Susan...the fictional male and the woman reading the manuscript...maybe the premise was just too meta to portray effectively. ..only my own thoughts...and maybe just a little disappointed ...

[–] Dondi0 8 years ago

Agreed.

It really wanted to be an arthouse flick loaded with metaphor, symbolic imagery, a fractured narrative structure and elliptical editing a la Lynch etc, but Ford feared the audience 'not getting it' so painted in too broad strokes and telegraphed and signposted everything far too clearly. I cannot believe that some people are struggling to 'work out' what happened.Everything was so damned obvious.

Also a lot of the dialogue, especially in the 'art world' scenes, was excruciating and the performances, bar Michael Shannon, were often hilariously bad too, both of which didn't help matters.

A Single Man was so very good, so beautifully observed and staged, so Ford can make good movies, but this seems to not only have missed by quite a distance but also managed to fool so many critics into believing its 'deep' when ironically, given its subtextual subject matter, it is actually all surface gloss.

Hell and High Water was also very heavy-handed with its visual metaphors and subtext (BANKS ARE BAD! NEO-LIBERAL CAPITALISM IS THE REAL CRIME!) but it was a much better film, with superior performances and a more timely moral message. I mean, an argument could be made that one of the things that Nocturnal Animals posits is that abortion is murder...

Now, whether or not that was intentional, Ford should certainly have been more aware that the analogy was implicit should someone wish to view it that way.

Oh well, here's hoping Arrival lives up to the 'intelligent' sci-fi hype.

[–] edinabb 8 years ago

After the election, Michael Shannon joked the gangleader is Trump (so Susan and her second husband are Trump and Melania!)

Tony is America.

Bobbie is??

:)

[–] fn-sj 8 years ago

I agree Dondi0, I'm hoping Arrival delivers and reading the reviews I think it might.

I sensed that Ford bit off more than he could chew with Nocturnal Animals, maybe the art world theme attracted him. Either way, I think he will excel at more intimate movies and develop further the finesse he brought to A Single Man.

It often happens ... that 1st time directors get carried away with their initial success and over reach on their next projects instead of realising that great directors develop a specific style and work within that...and it works!

[–] kElevrA7 8 years ago

+++

The two of you killed everything I ever loved. **** you both.