Man From UNCLE
Sep. 20th, 2015 01:46 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
redfiona99Since I think it deserved more of a write up than a quick post that was mostly me squeaking about the central three characters.
Summarised thoughts first:
It's a fine bit of nonsense fluff.
Despite that I am more than a little bit conflicted, and annoyed at myself, because I really should be able to separate it from the show and I can't, and I can't help but go, 'it's good, but it's not UNCLE,' which is silly.
I'd like to give praise to whoever was responsible for their mock-up of East Berlin because I was able to identify where most of these places were supposed to be, not just Checkpoint Charlie. Also the soundtrack was excellent.
Dear Guy Ritchie, you know my views on lens flare. Stop it.
Acutally Ritchie trying to be too clever with his directing and it not working was a recurrent problem.
I liked Henry Cavill's Napoleon Solo, even if I was less than convinced by his US accent. And, yes Guy Ritchie, I know you want him to be Bond. (I am not joking, Cavill got to do the barrel shot and everything.) Cavill also got to be in the scene that came closest to proper UNCLE when Victoria drugs him and he lies down before he collapses because this is not his first time.
I feel guilty about how much longer my Ilya section is going to be but ... from a whole family of Ilya fans.
Armie Hammer's Ilya suffers the most from this not being UNCLE because I like his take but I should love it but ... that's not Ilya. And not a single bit of it is the actor's fault.
For a start, he's far too cheerful and uncontrolled to be Ilya. Even his dour is a lot lighter.
That being said, the one bit they do get right is that when Ilya falls, he falls hard and Ilya and Gaby are adorable!!! (Please assume all the hearts and squee.)
One of the things that left me most conflicted was Ilya's temper and how they showed it. It's supposed to be part of his antisocial personality disorder (film's diagnosis, not mine). On the one hand, it's one of the best takes on having an explosive temper problem I have seen (my fingers don't twitch, but the muscles at the top of my throat constrict and dear God, people, let me storm out on those occasions. There is less property damage that way. [For reassurance of all, it has been 9 years since I last had a completely unstoppable rage. I have learnt to count to ten, take deep breaths and walk out if necessary.]). On the other hand, that's not Ilya.
One thing I did like was that the film didn't make either of them better than the other, nor did their on-going attempts at one-up-manship interfere with the mission.
I'm not sure why both Solo and Ilya had to be scuzzied up. Are good guy heroes out of vogue?
I do, however, <3 how they choose not to kill each other. It's lovely.
I <3 Gaby. Even with her thoroughly peculiar German (I have no idea how a Swede can be that bad at German). I mean, she was blatantly added to have a female good guy, but they worked her in very well and gave her stuff to do that was utterly her own thing. Even if what she did made very little sense at various points. Like Gaby, sweetheart, dearest, why are you winding up the Russian rage-beast?
The bad guys knew they were in an UNCLE film and were the right kind of pointed campy. Particularly Sylvester Groth as Uncle Rudi (which caused a brief moment of cognitive dissonance because I too have an Uncle Rudi). The scene where he's torturing Solo is another one that could have come straight out of proper UNCLE. Also, kudos to the casting director, Uncle Rudi and Dr. Teller could have been brothers.
UNCLE and Waverly being that particular kind of British is such British wish-fulfillment. It fulfills the same thing as the regular James Bond scenes where the US secret services are useless or worse. It's the general thing of 'the Soviets out-tech us, and the US have more money and arms but the British have moxie and nous.'
Smaller notes:
- A trabi car chase is something I never thought I'd see. I'm reasonably sure they couldn't got that fast but I am willing to go with it.
- No way would Ilya not have done more research on architecture.
- Count Lippe - Bond shout-out?
- I really didn't like how Ritchie shot the raid on the island and the final chase.
- What's the over and under on Solo's boss (hello Jared Harris) being the Soviet mole?
As you can see, it's a film I am overwhelmingly positive about, but it's not UNCLE.
Summarised thoughts first:
It's a fine bit of nonsense fluff.
Despite that I am more than a little bit conflicted, and annoyed at myself, because I really should be able to separate it from the show and I can't, and I can't help but go, 'it's good, but it's not UNCLE,' which is silly.
I'd like to give praise to whoever was responsible for their mock-up of East Berlin because I was able to identify where most of these places were supposed to be, not just Checkpoint Charlie. Also the soundtrack was excellent.
Dear Guy Ritchie, you know my views on lens flare. Stop it.
Acutally Ritchie trying to be too clever with his directing and it not working was a recurrent problem.
I liked Henry Cavill's Napoleon Solo, even if I was less than convinced by his US accent. And, yes Guy Ritchie, I know you want him to be Bond. (I am not joking, Cavill got to do the barrel shot and everything.) Cavill also got to be in the scene that came closest to proper UNCLE when Victoria drugs him and he lies down before he collapses because this is not his first time.
I feel guilty about how much longer my Ilya section is going to be but ... from a whole family of Ilya fans.
Armie Hammer's Ilya suffers the most from this not being UNCLE because I like his take but I should love it but ... that's not Ilya. And not a single bit of it is the actor's fault.
For a start, he's far too cheerful and uncontrolled to be Ilya. Even his dour is a lot lighter.
That being said, the one bit they do get right is that when Ilya falls, he falls hard and Ilya and Gaby are adorable!!! (Please assume all the hearts and squee.)
One of the things that left me most conflicted was Ilya's temper and how they showed it. It's supposed to be part of his antisocial personality disorder (film's diagnosis, not mine). On the one hand, it's one of the best takes on having an explosive temper problem I have seen (my fingers don't twitch, but the muscles at the top of my throat constrict and dear God, people, let me storm out on those occasions. There is less property damage that way. [For reassurance of all, it has been 9 years since I last had a completely unstoppable rage. I have learnt to count to ten, take deep breaths and walk out if necessary.]). On the other hand, that's not Ilya.
One thing I did like was that the film didn't make either of them better than the other, nor did their on-going attempts at one-up-manship interfere with the mission.
I'm not sure why both Solo and Ilya had to be scuzzied up. Are good guy heroes out of vogue?
I do, however, <3 how they choose not to kill each other. It's lovely.
I <3 Gaby. Even with her thoroughly peculiar German (I have no idea how a Swede can be that bad at German). I mean, she was blatantly added to have a female good guy, but they worked her in very well and gave her stuff to do that was utterly her own thing. Even if what she did made very little sense at various points. Like Gaby, sweetheart, dearest, why are you winding up the Russian rage-beast?
The bad guys knew they were in an UNCLE film and were the right kind of pointed campy. Particularly Sylvester Groth as Uncle Rudi (which caused a brief moment of cognitive dissonance because I too have an Uncle Rudi). The scene where he's torturing Solo is another one that could have come straight out of proper UNCLE. Also, kudos to the casting director, Uncle Rudi and Dr. Teller could have been brothers.
UNCLE and Waverly being that particular kind of British is such British wish-fulfillment. It fulfills the same thing as the regular James Bond scenes where the US secret services are useless or worse. It's the general thing of 'the Soviets out-tech us, and the US have more money and arms but the British have moxie and nous.'
Smaller notes:
- A trabi car chase is something I never thought I'd see. I'm reasonably sure they couldn't got that fast but I am willing to go with it.
- No way would Ilya not have done more research on architecture.
- Count Lippe - Bond shout-out?
- I really didn't like how Ritchie shot the raid on the island and the final chase.
- What's the over and under on Solo's boss (hello Jared Harris) being the Soviet mole?
As you can see, it's a film I am overwhelmingly positive about, but it's not UNCLE.
