Post by mikef6 on Aug 4, 2017 2:39:41 GMT
THERE MAY BE SPOILERS IN THE REVIEW FOR “COMPLETE UNKNOWN” BUT ANY OTHER REVIEW YOU FIND ANYWHERE ELSE WILL DESCRIBE THE SAME PLOT, ONLY WITHOUT THE WARNING. SO YOU MIGHT AS WELL READ IT HERE.
Complete Unknown / Joshua Marston (2016). When we first see Alice (Rachel Weisz) she is looking at an apartment, then we see her as an ER nurse, then a magician’s assistant performing for a Chinese audience. Finally, after the title appears on the screen, she is in NYC. What’s going on? At a lunchroom in a government office building, Alice engineers a Meet Cute with Clyde who works with a department that writes policy guidelines for land use. Her purpose is to get a date to the birthday party of Clyde’s co-worker, Tom (Michael Shannon). Meanwhile, we meet Tom and his wife Ramina (Azita Ghanizada) and find out they are having problems because she wants to move to California for her own profession. At the party, Tom recognizes Alice but she doesn’t know him and ignores him when he calls her “Jennie.” The set-up is for some kind of twisty mystery or an existential mystery, but at exactly the half-way time, Alice/Jennie’s story is revealed and the second half is comprised of a quiet conversation between Tom and Jennie in the late night/early morning hours as they walk around New York. A lot of other reviewers knock a lot of points for this tonal shift, but I thought it kind of interesting in the way they turn around the usual thriller formula of slow start followed by the mystery and suspense. I have seen Weisz in three new films in 2017 (Denial and My Cousin Rachel are the other two) and she has shot to the top of my list of favorite current actresses. I’ve always been mixed about Shannon and remain that way. Azita Ghanizada (who came to the U.S. as a political refugee with her parents) quite easily takes the few scenes she is in just by showing up in them. This film is not a total success but recommendable as an appealing curiosity.
Complete Unknown / Joshua Marston (2016). When we first see Alice (Rachel Weisz) she is looking at an apartment, then we see her as an ER nurse, then a magician’s assistant performing for a Chinese audience. Finally, after the title appears on the screen, she is in NYC. What’s going on? At a lunchroom in a government office building, Alice engineers a Meet Cute with Clyde who works with a department that writes policy guidelines for land use. Her purpose is to get a date to the birthday party of Clyde’s co-worker, Tom (Michael Shannon). Meanwhile, we meet Tom and his wife Ramina (Azita Ghanizada) and find out they are having problems because she wants to move to California for her own profession. At the party, Tom recognizes Alice but she doesn’t know him and ignores him when he calls her “Jennie.” The set-up is for some kind of twisty mystery or an existential mystery, but at exactly the half-way time, Alice/Jennie’s story is revealed and the second half is comprised of a quiet conversation between Tom and Jennie in the late night/early morning hours as they walk around New York. A lot of other reviewers knock a lot of points for this tonal shift, but I thought it kind of interesting in the way they turn around the usual thriller formula of slow start followed by the mystery and suspense. I have seen Weisz in three new films in 2017 (Denial and My Cousin Rachel are the other two) and she has shot to the top of my list of favorite current actresses. I’ve always been mixed about Shannon and remain that way. Azita Ghanizada (who came to the U.S. as a political refugee with her parents) quite easily takes the few scenes she is in just by showing up in them. This film is not a total success but recommendable as an appealing curiosity.