I tend not to be disappointed by films, since I usually have an intuitive sense on whether it will be good or not. But "Viktor Vogel" ,or as it's known in the States, "Advertising Rules!" (??) really let me down.
For the first two thirds, I was really into the movie, even though the melodrama was typical and the main conflict was telegraphed from about 500 miles away. The situations were amusing. The characters were likable. It seemed to bring up some good points about the nature of consumerism and the purpose of one's life, which is more than you can ask from any given American film. But the last third slowed down significantly, and suddenly I became very bored. The ending, however, blew me away, in the worst possible way.
I imagine the filmmakers standing around the set with a deadline looming and an incomplete script:
"Man, I don't know how to end this damn movie! How are we supposed to solve the conflict? It's so huge!"
"Well, let's have really random things come out of nowhere so the audience will go, 'Hey, that makes me think!' And then we'll end it right there, with no explanation as to what happened in the last five minutes."
Don't get me wrong, I love weird, funky twists and weird, funky movies, but "Viktor Vogel" was not able to pull it off. It was like a pilot for a network comedy, only for the last ten minutes to be written by David Lynch at 2 AM, who had not read the beginning of the script.
Enjoy it for what it is, but don't get your hopes up that it gets tied together at the end.
5/10
For the first two thirds, I was really into the movie, even though the melodrama was typical and the main conflict was telegraphed from about 500 miles away. The situations were amusing. The characters were likable. It seemed to bring up some good points about the nature of consumerism and the purpose of one's life, which is more than you can ask from any given American film. But the last third slowed down significantly, and suddenly I became very bored. The ending, however, blew me away, in the worst possible way.
I imagine the filmmakers standing around the set with a deadline looming and an incomplete script:
"Man, I don't know how to end this damn movie! How are we supposed to solve the conflict? It's so huge!"
"Well, let's have really random things come out of nowhere so the audience will go, 'Hey, that makes me think!' And then we'll end it right there, with no explanation as to what happened in the last five minutes."
Don't get me wrong, I love weird, funky twists and weird, funky movies, but "Viktor Vogel" was not able to pull it off. It was like a pilot for a network comedy, only for the last ten minutes to be written by David Lynch at 2 AM, who had not read the beginning of the script.
Enjoy it for what it is, but don't get your hopes up that it gets tied together at the end.
5/10