Sentences with phrase «narrative momentum»

A deliberately paced literary film that takes too long to build narrative momentum and explore its central dramatic conflicts.

But there's also no attempt at narrative momentum from movie to movie anymore.

The director's objective is to emphasize drama over suspense and, as a result, the kind of fast pace and narrative momentum often associated with a thriller is absent here.

As directed by John Curran (Tracks), the deliberately paced film takes a straightforward approach yet too often lacks narrative momentum.

The writing on showcase here differs from most R - rated fare, not so reliant on pervasive profanity, gross - out humor / nudity, or joke - to - joke writing with no propelling narrative momentum once said joke ends.

Regardless of how one might feel about its inherently icky subject matter, Dark Crimes needs more narrative momentum.

So sixteen years later, Otomo makes his return to feature - length anime with the deadly Steamboy, a film that fails in almost all of the same ways that Akira failed while falling short, too, in terms of relative historical importance and even the low standard that that seminal work set for narrative momentum.

In terms of gangster films, while it may not rise to the level of a Scorsese or Coppola opus, Scott's film can reside comfortably on the same tier as those made by Michael Mann or Brian De Palma, whose films balanced slick direction with stellar acting — rather lengthy, yet without ever losing narrative momentum.

Rather than collecting a bunch of funny people together on a set and just letting them riff, the film establishes coherent characters and drops them into a twisty mystery plot that's tightly crafted enough to generate some real narrative momentum while never getting too bogged down in its own plot that it forgets to be funny.

Coogan is a gifted comic performer, for sure, but oftentimes this actively acts against the movie, since it feels like there aren't individually crafted scenes, or even much in the way of forward narrative momentum.

What could have been a clichéd motif — it's a common trope that food equals nourishment equals love — becomes incredibly specific to this movie and this couple because Anderson presents it a little differently each time, creating narrative momentum and fleshing out character through what could have been a flat symbol.

Mood prevails over narrative momentum in this elliptical drama that's admirable for its vision even as it keeps its characters at a frustrating emotional distance.

It starts as an intriguing enough mystery, evolves into a suitable second - act quest; however, some third - act «twists» just derail whatever narrative momentum the story manages to build, and muddles both the mythology and character relationships developed up to that point, leaving us with an awkward ending that doesn't feel much like an ending so much as a chapter break.

It also kills narrative momentum at the most critical moments of the endgame chapters, and it almost ruined the game for me — wasting my time as a player is a cardinal sin as far as I'm concerned, and Dead Rising 3 does that far too often near the end.

and an infantile but to - the - point narrative momentum, Retaliation has almost no character development and its second act is a disaster of storytelling.

With critical - favorite character actor Walton Goggins joining the returning Maze Runner ensemble and most of the same players involved behind the scenes, The Death Cure should be able to bring things to a satisfying conclusion without sacrificing narrative momentum or stretching things out unnecessarily in the process (a la its fellow YA dystopian properties).

A classic cocktail of mystery, suspense and paranoia, Guillaume Canet's Tell No One is a tense thriller with a knotty plot that harkens back to Hitch in its themes while satiating modern audiences with its brisk narrative momentum and elaborate action sequences.

The notion — by some of my fellow reviewers — that the book is too long is precisely the reason I found it captivating... Indeed, most contemporary books are so in love with their own postmodernity that they often run out of narrative momentum within the first 200 pages.

Buck is a mildly diverting memoirist, and the chronicle of his personal adventure is not without its moments — though it does suffer from a certain monotony, as only so much narrative momentum can be generated through the recitation of the daily tasks of hitch the mules, steer the wagon, find a campsite, unhitch the mules, cook dinner, sleep under the stars.

- Library Journal «Though inventive and well crafted, the novel neither fully endears its characters to the reader nor establishes narrative momentum, playing at themes and romantic entanglements that are expertly introduced but often under - explored and discarded.

They describe the plot as, «terribly uninteresting» and having, «less narrative momentum here than there ever has been.»

Saddled by the weaknesses of the printed word, in other words, Jackson does his best to balance the schizophrenia of Tolkien's novel with his own sense of narrative momentum.

Regardless, Collee, and by extension Amiel, are so heartily invested in showcasing Darwin's descent into near - madness, and injecting overwrought emotionalism into their story, that they dip into dream - sequence - within - dream - sequence nonsense, to the detriment of any accrued interest and narrative momentum in Darwin's scientific research and writing.

Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor (genre mechanics with a gift for narrative momentum but weak on story) write and produce but don't direct (Jimmy Hayward gets credit there), and this dull mess could really used some of their hairbrained excess just to make it interesting.

This contemporary (im) morality tale suffers from the relentless misogyny and unpleasantness of its male characters and the static quality of the staging which approximate a theatrical mode, lacking narrative momentum or dramatic excitement.

It's the fact the robots are more human than the people that gives the show its narrative momentum.

human than the people that gives the show its narrative momentum.

Antiviral never builds the sort of character investment or narrative momentum that would allow its visceral horrors to seriously disturb, rather than seeming like choice gross - out moments lovingly designed for maximum viewer recoil.

There are other issues here, ones that involve pacing and tone and narrative momentum and Bilbo's own lack of significance in a story that's allegedly all about him, but all I can think about right now, 30 minutes after exiting the theater, is how badly I need to go see it again at a reasonable 24 frames per second in regular old 2D in the hope that I can fully immerse myself into this too - long, too - repetitive saga.

While she keeps the action hopping from one flash point to the next and cooks up a couple of exciting sequences in the last 30 minutes, she doesn't develop the narrative momentum needed to sustain a two - hour story.

Critics Consensus: 13 Minutes explores an oft - neglected corner of World War II history with just enough craft and narrative momentum to offset a disappointing lack of subtlety.

Critic Consensus: 13 Minutes explores an oft - neglected corner of World War II history with just enough craft and narrative momentum to offset a disappointing lack of subtlety.

At times, there's more repetition than narrative momentum.

The problem comes when you try to do that kind of comedy for two hours rather than 30 minutes, because a big - screen R - rated comedy comes with the built - in expectation that it's going to have the comedic and narrative momentum of the train in Unstoppable.

John Ford, so long ignored as a serious film artist, used to tell his interviewers again and again about «invisible cutting,» by which he meant filming and then editing a picture so smoothly that the narrative momentum meant more to the audience than anything else.

All it ends up being is a collection of funny, oddball moments, feebly strung together, but never really generating any kind of comic or narrative momentum.

That said, the biggest problem is the pacing - which, coupled with the convoluted segments of the plot, rob the film of any narrative momentum.

Take a bunch of derivative narrative elements, shake furiously, and pour them out onto the screen without any discernible talent or narrative momentum.

With a considerably scattershot plot, one which has a somewhat episode design, Nerdland lacks some of the narrative momentum that comes from more cohesive stories.

Its main concern isn't with the narrative momentum, or character - driven actions as it should be, but rather with big, hulking action set - pieces.

Shifting between the three main characters in a haphazard, often bewildering manner, Kick - Ass 2 never builds any narrative momentum, feeling much more like a routine series of unrelated episodes about Life In These Trying Times.

Fans of the genre will love it, but those expecting a sense of narrative momentum...

«Stoppard's famed wit is largely undetectable, and the narrative momentum thwarted by choppy editing choices.

By the end of Christmas, Again's brief runtime, Poekel's preference of little to no narrative momentum begins to wear things down, but not enough to cause any serious damage.

The narrative momentum that Hugo's journey had built up evaporates, and now we are exploring why Papa Georges — as his ward, Isabelle (Chloë Grace Moretz: Let Me In, Kick - Ass), and Hugo's new friend, calls him — is so sad, why he won't return Hugo's little notebook full of drawings of the automaton, and what secret he is harboring of his past that he won't talk about.

But Midnight Special is a chase movie, and like all chase movies it runs the risk of losing all narrative momentum once it arrives at a destination.