I must admit, I went in a bit sceptical. I haven't seen many of his movies and what I'd seen wasn't too bad. Realistically, I didn't think much of what I was about to see.
Needless to say, I was pleasantly surprised.
Story/Dialogue: The story, though simple, was rather excellent. However, the exposition was delivered in such a way that made me groan (Good exposition as a rule should be delivered while characters are doing something, 1. To get a feel for who they are and what they like to do and 2. To get all the information you require. When this is done poorly, it leaves a bad taste in your mouth. Kind of like the nasty after taste of breakfast juice.) While the initial interaction between the protagonist and his wife is both ingenious and tragic, the dialogue could have stood to be a bit better.
But after this rather lumbering start, the story took off.
With all that said, The other issue I had was that characters were poorly introduced.. The protagonist's name wasn't established until at least fifty minutes into the movie. You couldn't keep track of who was important and who wasn't.
But with all that said, the story was enthralling. There were some witty one liners that made you laugh and some of the supporting characters were more likeable than the protagonist, which unfortunately set him in the background.
Cinematography: Visually outstanding. The sets and the places created this sense of Old World wonder. Even the scenes in Australia were beautiful. It made you WANT to go there. Furthermore, the VFX was incredibly subtle to the point where you couldn't work out if it was actually green screen or not.
There were camera effects and shots that I found myself questioning, however.
In a part where Major Hasan is talking to the head digger (Whose name escapes me, due to the above stated issue of not introducing characters properly.) they zoomed in on his face as he was talking. That was quite popular during the 70's and 80's, but frankly I find it shoddy camera work.
The other one was a scene in which the three boys were going out to fight and the camera had this blur effect on. Mr. Crowe clearly forgot that he was directing a film and not a music video from the 90's.
These two visual issues aside, I enjoyed the visual eye candy.
Audio: In regards to audio, it is important to find a balance between the music and the ambience. It is also appropriate to use one over the other where one and not both will have maximum impact.
When you have the two compete, it makes the over all aesthetic feel ugly and out of balance.
Such is what I found with this movie. Moments where ambience would have created a sense of reverence for places that they were in were poor design choices and I feel that this is where the movie was lacking.
Overall: This movie is worth the watch, warts and all. While I complain about these things that I picked up on, I found the characters likeable, even if I didn't know their names. The places were wonderful and created a great atmosphere. But the audio is ultimately where it was let down.
With respect to Mr. Crowe, however, a great debut.
4 stars.
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