Well I was willing to let the first murmurs go by without commentary, but the more I poke around, the more I’m hearing that the footage from David Fincher’s “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button” shown last night at the director’s tribute is underwhelming to say the least.
This is disconcerting. As much as I loved Eric Roth’s screenplay, I also made it a point of mentioning that it had a lot of room to be interpreted peculiarly on screen. It’s the sort of narrative that could fly off the rails in the transition and it seems that perhaps — just perhaps — this could be the case.
I’m keeping my hopes up for the moment, but it seems Jeffrey Wells conveyed these sentiments from one attendee:
It just wasn’t particularly exciting or engrossing, one explained. Excellent visual effects (old Pitt as a baby, etc.) and fine cinematography but with a kind of enervated, waiting-for-something-to-happen quality. The footage showed portions of the entire film, the other friend said, but in a way that kept you from getting into it with cuts coming too abruptly. And so people were kind of…whatever, grunting and muttering on the way out.
And now Peter Sciretta of /Film has unloaded this first hand reaction:
I’m all for conserving the director’s artistic vision, and I’ve enjoyed most of Fincher’s work, even if Zodiac could have been 30 minutes shorter on the back end. So when I first heard rumors of the studio pushing Fincher to cut back, my first response was to write it off as another movie studio exec that just didn’t get it. But as it turns out, they might be right.
The footage I screened tonight was met with disappointment and concern. There are moments of magic and wonder, but interrupted and surrounded by moments which had me questioning, “Is this really the best footage he has?”
Sciretta has some nice words to say about Brad Pitt and the cinematography, but regardless of the brief high marks, I don’t think I’m alone in saying: “Gulp…”
Comments
13 responses to “‘Button’ footage raises concerns at Telluride”
Seriously, I don’t think any serious conclusions can be drawn from 20 minutes of footage – particularly when isolated from such a dense, complex piece of work.
I’d wait to see the whole thing before getting concerned.
As for a “waiting-for-something-to-happen quality,” uh, isn’t that kind of the point of teaser reels?
From what I’ve read the 20 minutes were snippets of scenes instead of say the first 20 minutes of the film. This might have played a role in the confused/umimpressed reaction. This still is my most anticipated film of the season. *crosses fingers*
Here’s a detailed breakdown of the footage that was shown at Telluride: http://blog.spout.com/2008/08/30/the-curious-case-of-benjamin-button-preview-telluride-2008/
Maybe this won’t turn out like we all had hoped. I was really expecting everyone to come out blown away.
What’s the point of showing so little footage anyway? Either show a new trailer or show nothing.
I’m sure it will be fine.
just reading the recap Bryan posted it seemed quite interesting. I think Fincher may have done the right thing in showing scenes and pieces of scenes rather than a real portion of the film. it was a 20 minute teaser. i think everybody needs to chill out
It sounds like a dumb move to organize the footage like this. Showing the first 10 minutes would’ve been much wiser.
I love how most people are now making excuses, yet if it were for a movie like “Australia” or “Revolutionary Road” they’d be calling it dead in the water and an epic failure.
Still, I think Fincher’s done one thing with his career and that’s earned our trust. Let’s just wait and see, okay?
[…] 20-minute taster of “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button” — a riposte to the underwhelmed response from certain corners of the […]
[…] buzz is the buzz, and if a couple of guys didn’t dig it, they’re opinion is valid. We linked to the dissenters here. Jeff Wells did too (though Thompson mistakenly thought he was reviewing the […]
[…] 20 minutes of footage from “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button” may have been caught off guard by over-zealous bloggers in Telluride, but the damage may not have been as considerable as some may […]