Gervais/Merchant's first feature film is certainly worth a look, but not necessarily what you'd expect from the genius comic duo. Granted Gervais has stressed since pre-production that this is a more dramatic oriented film. While the film revolves around three friends, only two bring an enjoyable stimulation to the film, and unfortunately the one who doesn't happens to be the main character. While the acting is neither poor nor above and beyond, you do not feel apart of nor feel any reality behind Freddie's motivations or central plot.
Gervais himself who appears maybe five times in the film will unfortunately let hardcore fans down as his scenes feel the most contrived and desperate for laughs in an otherwise seemingly unfunny film. As though Gervais wanted to make a quite dramatic film but had some desperation to gather some laughs whenever he's called to action himself. To coincide with the uneasy relationship between audiences and Freddie's journey, the film at times feels choppy and moving quite slowly for a 90 minute film. I personally find Gervais downfall to be in his time restrictions. He made it clear during the production of the dreadful Invention of Lying that he does not feel a comedy should be any longer than 90 minutes. While Ghost Town his best, in my opinion, feature film yet is of course the longest. It seems in his development process Gervais insists on severing scenes that while as a stand alone scene are of little value, they would crucially link the film's plot development in a more fashionable way. While this of course is mainly conjecture since I have not seen the films with certain scenes in place and perhaps instead of making a decent film a hit, would instead make excruciating.
However unlike the dreaded Invention of Lying who's main plot development involves ten montages, poor transitions and amateur editing, Cemetery Junction does flow as a whole much better, but still falls short of the perfection of the Office or Extras.
Having said that the positives of this movie certainly outweigh the negatives. The story is nice, although almost completely unreal. The side story with Bruce and his dad is certainly the highlight of the film even it is painfully predictable. And the nice love issues with Snoggy are quite good. Also an excellent performance from Ralph Fiennes. Additionally there is a hilarious scene with Stephen Merchant who seems to alone save the midpoint of the film from treading water. And an excellent blink and you miss it cameo from Karl Pilkington,
In all a good film worth watching is if it's on cable, but you can't help but wonder if Gervais is trying to live up to an impossible standard
Gervais himself who appears maybe five times in the film will unfortunately let hardcore fans down as his scenes feel the most contrived and desperate for laughs in an otherwise seemingly unfunny film. As though Gervais wanted to make a quite dramatic film but had some desperation to gather some laughs whenever he's called to action himself. To coincide with the uneasy relationship between audiences and Freddie's journey, the film at times feels choppy and moving quite slowly for a 90 minute film. I personally find Gervais downfall to be in his time restrictions. He made it clear during the production of the dreadful Invention of Lying that he does not feel a comedy should be any longer than 90 minutes. While Ghost Town his best, in my opinion, feature film yet is of course the longest. It seems in his development process Gervais insists on severing scenes that while as a stand alone scene are of little value, they would crucially link the film's plot development in a more fashionable way. While this of course is mainly conjecture since I have not seen the films with certain scenes in place and perhaps instead of making a decent film a hit, would instead make excruciating.
However unlike the dreaded Invention of Lying who's main plot development involves ten montages, poor transitions and amateur editing, Cemetery Junction does flow as a whole much better, but still falls short of the perfection of the Office or Extras.
Having said that the positives of this movie certainly outweigh the negatives. The story is nice, although almost completely unreal. The side story with Bruce and his dad is certainly the highlight of the film even it is painfully predictable. And the nice love issues with Snoggy are quite good. Also an excellent performance from Ralph Fiennes. Additionally there is a hilarious scene with Stephen Merchant who seems to alone save the midpoint of the film from treading water. And an excellent blink and you miss it cameo from Karl Pilkington,
In all a good film worth watching is if it's on cable, but you can't help but wonder if Gervais is trying to live up to an impossible standard