The Flock - Dunkle Triebe

The films starts of good: the premise is intriguing and there are some scenes that get you dragged into the movie. As the movie progresses, the script starts making less and less sense and the last twenty minutes felt incredibly rushed and out of tone.

The direction wasn't good at all. What bothered me for instance was the camera-work. Too many different styles are mixed and it all ends up looking incredibly sloppy instead of the intended 'modern/flashy' effect. The music should have been better too. There were numerous examples of scenes that should have been silent that had music playing in the background and vice versa. Also, the music played was not of the highest quality.

The film is somewhat engaging, it deals with a sensitive subject and tries to deal with it in an honest yet confronting matter. At least, in the beginning. In the 2nd part of the movie there's little left of the objectivity in the script. I won't name any concrete examples because I don't want to spoil it for anyone but I'm sure you'll know what I'm talking about if you ever see it.

The acting was all right in my opinion. Not top notch but not horrible either. Gere is average like always and Danes doesn't really leave big impression either. The supporting cast should've been better, the example of Miss Avril Lavigne immediately comes to mind. She manages to ruin the only scene she has.

Many people will compare this movie to 8mm, because of the similar harsh theme but they have little in common. 8mm is a lot more powerful,darker and shows more guts(not literally). It's easily the better film. There are some shocking scenes in 'The Flock', one of which resembles a scene in 8mm a lot but this time they lacked the nerve to go all the way.

To summarize, is this movie bad? No, but it won't blow you away. The ideas are interesting but after a while the script feels uninspired and formulaic. The acting is mediocre and the score is bad. It's not really worth seeing but it'll briefly entertain you.

5.4/10

I finally caught "The Flock" on HBO. A taping at 4:20 am while I was asleep, true, but it's better watched at that hour, methinks. It was apparently only released to theaters in Japan and Turkey, from all reports, but North Americans really didn't miss much.

It's professionally produced, pairs Claire Danes memorably with Richard Gere, and makes their interplay (standard retiring-burnout-and-protégé) entirely believable in most ways.

The gore and corpses aren't beyond those in many modern horror movies, though the camera often lingers more than it should. The fetishes (and worse) of Gere's monitored ex-cons shouldn't shock anyone who's ever been in a triple-X shop.

Danes's acting is superb, especially in pursuing an abductor's trail (standard police-procedural, though by non-cops) with Gere's brooding and effective Errol. What blew a hole in this, though, is that she was miscast in the first place.

Even though one of Gere's well-worn "flock" is female, nearly all are intimidating men, and the role her character Allison is training to take up calls for more heft. Both physically and professionally.

I didn't believe for one minute that Allison chose such a grueling job out of anything more than economic need, certainly not from any more personal calling. No hints are made as to her motivation, nor is anything mentioned of her personal life, beyond nosy behavior and a clumsy allusion by compulsive background-checker Errol.

It's a miscasting on a par with what was done with Danes in "The Mod Squad," but unlike that idiocy of a plot-mangled remake, this gives Danes a quite strong setup — and much gore and many sad fetishes — to play against. If you accept that someone of her perception and refinement would ever take that job in the first place, that is.

Turn to it on cable, but I wouldn't take the effort to even go to the video store or put it in a Netflix queue. It's worth one viewing.

(Most of this review originally appeared on the IMDb board for Claire Danes, followed by considerable discussion.)

First of all i have seen 8 mm and i am normally quite resistant to some 'heavy' images. But this movie did disturb me.

Most of the viewers complain the movie had a very bad pace, to few twist turns. I both agreed and disagreed here, yes when watching the movie you know who's 'dunnit' way to early but I loved the pace. In my eyes they really made time to make you loath the bad guys and feel repulsed by the idea what they did to those poor girls.

Richard gere was holding back like always, but I often find he's perfect for these roles. Maybe he did not put of a good performance, but he was just made for these roles. Claire Danes didn't impress me in this movie, quite a shame cause i normally really love claire danes ;). You kind of get the idea they used her for eye candy above everything else.

The first 80 minutes of the movie were quite decent in my eyes but the last 20 minutes were a bit of a disappointment. They seemed to be a bit over the top.

All in all a decent movie. 6 out of 10

I have just seen this movie. It just opened today (November 9th 2007) in Spain. Let me say that I understand the bad word of mouth the movie is having, it deals with a difficult subject (sexual abusers) and its tone is as dark as say "9 MM", if not darker.

But all things considered it's a pretty good film. The investigation angle makes for a very tense thriller, but where the film really shines is in the depiction of Richard Gere's characters, as well as the villain's, which I won't reveal.

Gere is really all stops go here, it's easily his most intense role since "Internal Affairs". Even if you are not Gere fans, you're gonna love him in this.

On the minus side, I didn't like the way the film is edited. It's full of flashes, freeze frames and all those "arty" stuff they cram into your TV series and direct-to-DVD movies. I understand they wanted to give the movie a hard edge, but it's often too distracting. The film is already dark and gritty enough as it is, and this bells and whistles don't add a damn thing.

And then there's Claire Danes. look, she's an OK actress, but she was like a fish out of water here. They give her character some interesting background, but she's constantly out off key. She looks like a raving lunatic when she tries to act quirky or vulnerable, and not very convincing when the script calls for her character to toughen up a little.

So, it's an interesting movie if you can go beyond the surface of its visual trickery, but not as good as it could be. I would say it earns a 6'5 - 7 in my scale.

After Chicago, I was beginning to lose all respect for Richard Gere and then along came The Flock. There's just so far a nice smile and a couple of stock facial gestures can get you, but he proved to me that he's finally gotten hold of his craft and can act with the best of them. Clare Danes was also super as his "trainee/replacement". Some have suggested there was too much unnecessary violence, but I don't see it that way. Nothing I saw detracted from the power of this film. I was really shocked I hadn't heard of it being released in theaters and came across it at Blockbuster instead. Really an exceptional film with just the right blend of action, suspense, thrills, and social consciousness. As good as 7even? Well, maybe. And you'll see better acting out of Gere than anyone's ever gotten out of Pitt.