The Greeting Cards Slave

I feel it's my moral duty to warn you against wasting time and money watching this irritating, soporific, overrated, B movie.

Actually, I am offending good B movies.

*Warning, spoilers.*

Some would say I am an insensitive, bitter spinster, but while I respect their opinion, I want to stress the fact that I love drama and I enjoy watching love stories, both those with unlikely happy endings and those with a heart-wrenching and depressing atmosphere more or less from minute 5.
I'm not afraid of praising emotional movies.
Provided they are involving. Well written. Well directed. Something like that.

"The film centers on a contemporary married couple, charting their evolution over a span of years by cross-cutting between time periods." (IMDb)

Oh yes. Contemporary means disaster. Obviously.
That's fine, down with Prince Charming and pathetic, spineless princesses waiting to be saved.
Let's show that reality is much harsher. Fair enough.

But if you want to portrait character's psychology, then do it properly.

One of the things I enjoy most the psychological development of characters.
Which basically doesn't exist in this movie.

A tiring sequence of scenes from the beginning and the end of a dull relationship between two unconvincing people.
Nothing in between. Apart from lot of drinking and smoking.

Why this unhappy lady falls out of love?
Because her husband is too childish? Because he's not ambitious with his job? Because he smokes and drinks too much?
All of them?

Has she ever been in love with him at all?
I don't think so.
He just saved her from an unwanted pregnancy and entertained her for a little while.

Anyway, this is just me guessing, since the director didn't make an effort to explain what happened.

I would say that the actors did their best. But seriously, if you really want to watch this movie, tell me if you find it worth 2 hours of your time. The best actor cannot work miracles with such a mediocre script.

The film feels slow most of the time. And I like slow movies.
I regard Yimou Zhan's "The Road Home" as one of the most touching and delicate movies I have ever seen. And it *is* a slow movie. But it doesn't bore you.

While watching "Blue Valentine", I kept yawning and checking the time.
Especially since I started realizing that the story wasn't going anywhere.

Can someone tell me why "Blue Valentine" received awards and nominations?

Labels: movies