Movie Details
| Title: | Domino | |
| Director: | Tony Scott | |
| Year: | 2005 | |
| Genre: | Action | |
| Times Seen: | 1 | |
| Last Seen: | 10.02.05 |
Other Movies Seen By This Director (6)
- Beverly Hills Cop II
- Crimson Tide
- Deja Vu
- Spy Game
- The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3
- True Romance
| Date Viewed | Venue | Note |
| 10.02.05 | Alamo South Lamar | Another Alamo/AICN sneak with writer/Donnie Darko master Richard Kelly in attendance. Tony Scott was supposed to be there too but he had to be location scouting for his new movie. Apparently it was to be set in New Orleans but now the studio wants to film in Miami and he's down in Nola now seeing if his locations are not, you know, destroyed. Anyway, this was at South Lamar and i got there super early because I was just sitting around here. Being first in line, I read through the new Alamo schedule. Sweet! A thanksgivving all-night horror marathon with all holiday-themed movies! I get to see Silent Night, Deadly Night again! Anyway, The movie is about a pretty rich girl model-cum-bounty huntress with a cool name played by Keira Knightley. She dresses in some hot clothes in this. She also shoots guns and uses some nunchakus. The movie follows Tony Scott's newfound love of shotgun-spray coverage. This guy's going crazy like Oliver Stone went crazy 15 years ago. Where some directors become mellower and more efficient with their camerawork as they age, Scott seems to be doing the exact opposite. It's physically exhausting watching his movies now... even Spy Game, which half the movie was basically Redford sitting in a room talking to people, overloads the senses with barrages of angles, speed, music, and film stock. This movie fits that mold pretty well. Where Man on Fire surprised me by being 10% better than I thought it would be, Domino is 10% worse. Maybe it's the added pressure of being a Richard Kelly script, maybe it's because the bar's still 10% higher after MoF, who knows. The end result is still a movie that's good, I just couldn't help but find a few problems with it. The main problem is that it lies to the audience. Subjective POV aside, it shows people die and later it says that they actually didn't die. I can see where they'd feel justified in doing that, but I think it wouldn't have been any worse if they hadn't... or maybe it would have.. maybe we are so expectant today of twists and surprises that we have to be lied to by the movie in order to ensure that no lame-ass says "i saw it coming" afterward in the lobby. I guess if i was making this movie, my hatred for that dude would convince me to put the scene in so.. I guess i don't have a problem with it anymore. My only other little tiff is that, in the Q&A with Richard Kelly afterward, he mentioned several times that it takes multiple viewings to figure out the puzzle of the movie and what's really going on. Not only am I fine with just one viewing in thinking that I have a pretty decent grasp of the movie, I also don't think there's really any puzzle to figure out and I don't think that Tony Scott made a "puzzle" movie. Certainly not like Donnie Darko. I guess that's not the movie's fault either though. So why didn't i just LOVE this movie? the setting was right, couldn't have been in a cooler environment to see it, I like all the actors involved... i just wasn't thrilled though. Something in the back of my mind kept pulling me back and viewing this from the outside. it could be the numerous stylistic and story "homages" Scott uses of his previous work or the occasional comment directed specifically at the audience, but those have been used in other movies that I Love... so who knows. I liked it, but wasn't blown away. There was an afterparty held at a shooting range where you could shoot clay pigeons with shotguns then drink beer. I didn't go though... I'm still pretty undecided, even after making the decision, but oh well |
