Waste of time

The Rover_360P

source: The Rover

Watched half of this movie - waiting for something to happen and nothing did! Just dude looking for his car! And Edward was not shining - maybe that's what is good about this movie :-) One episode liked - where Guy got his gun - that was interesting turn of events!!! The rest: well maybe somebody understood the movie, but for movie theater these days it's just slow and there is not one point in the start where You get caught in the movie and wait for something or start following script! There was nothing - watched half of the movie only because of the actors! Australia looked like old mad max movie - maybe they wanted to make some post collapse movie but ten years after collapse You are driving good condition vauxhall and You look like someone out of the job market for five years! See for yourself and get back to me if there is some deeper meaning in this, maybe the meaning of life (I am sarcastic) :-)

The Rover begins with some wit and energy, as three men fresh from some bloody crime get into a ridiculous argument and crash their car right in front of Guy Pearce's character's car. They steal his car and our very quiet lead character simply wants his car back and goes on the hunt. He quickly crosses paths with one of the men's injured mentally limited brother and they journey through a rundown landscape and form some sort of bond. This bare bones narrative has a nice set up, but becomes a monotonous series of detours that usually end in ugly ways. It's an ultimately pointless and empty exercise in sparse filmmaking and one note performances. When the resolution is reached the end result feels almost like a comedic punchline. The Rover is well shot and makes good use of its locations, but does little else and barely has a pulse.

And loses the plot completely. Technically this is a good film - sound, lighting, location, actors gave it their all. But it's a dud. Constructive criticism: Anything set in a post apocalyptic scenario, especially in the Australian Outback, will be compared to Mad Max 1 & 2. Joel Edgerton old buddy, you can't write films - stick to acting. If you produce a film in this genre, it has to add to the noir, not copy it. All stories need a beginning, a middle and an end - you MUST take the audience on a journey. If you don't grab the audience and hold them, attention wanders and pretty soon feet fidget, mobiles are switched on and messages are read - also opinions posted. I kept thinking all through this film "that's from Mad Max" "The Proposition" "No Country For Old Men", in fact anything by Cormac McCarthy, who has mastered the art of keeping a viewer compelled to watch. Australia is a unique setting - use it. This movie is a transplant of a US road wander, The Book of Eli, The Road and many others. There were barely three lines of Australian vernacular, everything else was US based, including the senseless American brothers characters, and the silly obsession with US currency (what's wrong with Australian money - it's all just worthless effen paper !) - a cynic would simply conclude it has been inserted to gain favour for US release. Neither they nor the rest of the world is that dumb. Seen a few movies guys ? So have we... The rest of the criticism is standard fare - stupid stunts, characters walking past perfectly serviceable weapons and vehicles, not collection spare ammunition, leaving automatic military weapons while sticking with 9mm pop-guns, suddenly producing cash when needed, "crazy" characters spouting supposed profound comments, the list goes on. Don't make the public think you're just cashing in on the word Australia - it's worth far more than that.

Excellent acting and marvelous photography are wasted on a script that has no focus and a musical score that suggests aboriginal influences which are not otherwise present. Literally every actor in this film delivers excellent performances, even the people with minor parts. As a post-apocalyptic film, the script offers very little new, and there are many inconsistencies that may be attributed to the Australian location. But this is no "Mad Max", and that's a shame. One of the core problems of the film is that there isn't anyone to root for, apart from a few transitory characters. The main characters are bad, very bad, and pathetic. Another problem with the film is the long ECUs. Generally speaking, long ECUs can serve a useful purpose, as they do in Leone's films. But less is more, and in this case, more is less.

It's very hard to give credit to anything in this movie, even where it might be do, when just about everything that happens involves people behaving like idiots. This nonsensical mess goes on and on but manages to be so off the charts bad that you are kept from leaving early. And then you receive your "reward" for waiting, an ending that will make you lose the mental brake that keeps you from spouting words at random at an elevated volume that convey to others the impression that you've just been had and feel a considerable amount of displeasure about the fact. "10 years after the collapse"? Of what, brains? Animal Kingdom at least made some kind of sense.

A very good performance by Guy Pearce, he show's very well a man who is suffering a lot and have nothing else to lose in a world that became a extremely dangerous place when basically anyone can't be trusted anymore, at least the part that was showed to us, but he still trying to survive because for the moment he still have one thing to do, also a very good make up work on him, that show's very well how a person would look living on those conditions. Robert Pattinson also gives a good performance of a man who is not necessarily a bad person, he has a limited mind and was more influenced to do bad things by the people's he used to live together, but in the end he don't actually wanna hurt anyone and fell guilty when he does, except when the movie need him to eliminates some peoples and save the main character, so that's kind of a negative point, but in the context of the movie this is not going to ruin the experience. The most negative point of the film are the persons who are the villains, but the real villain of the history is the world they are living, but again about the people's who are also the villains, they are not very strong during the film and until the very ending you don't understand why the main character is keep chasing them. I'm the end the most positive part of the movie is the "friendship" between Pearce and Pattinson characters, which is a good point, but not strong enough to maintain the film.

I have never felt the urge to write a movie review before, but after watching this movie I felt that I needed to warn those interested. Great actors, very poor writing. Guy Pearce isn't human, not in a good way either. Completely lifeless and emotionless acting. Robert gives a good effort, but there is not background or meaning to make you care about it. There is no plot, or anything meaningful about this movie. It is inexplicably bad on every level that a movie is judged on...fair warning. Pick a back up movie for when you walk out, it doesn't get better. Well I guess I need to write ten lines worth of a review. Hmmm not much else to mention.