Suburbicon: Bienvenidos al paraíso

SPOILER: I'm all for unique and different when it comes to filmmaking, but when a unique film doesn't do anything to intrigue its audience, aside from a consistent tone and setting, then it's not really all that impressive in the end. Suburbicon is George Clooney's latest attempt at direction, and I feel pretty much the same about this film as I did about many of his other works. A tone, story, and time period is all set up, but the way each of his films play out have seemed to leave a lot to be desired in my opinion. That is once again the case with Suburbicon, being a little too confident in itself when it came to presenting a powerful story. Here is why I think you could probably skip this one in theatres, but the effort put into it may warrant a rental if you're looking for something new to watch.

Gardner's family is tested when a group of men invade his home, killing his wife and leaving only his son and sister-in-law alive. Falling for his wife's sister and becoming a complete psychotic and uncontrollable man, this film quickly spirals out of control into a farce of random occurrences. Throughout the first act of this film, it seems like it's going to be a satire that won't hold anything back in terms of wackiness, but that's very quickly thrown out the window, compensating with many subplots of murder and conspiracy. I found myself taken out of the film when the tone would shift this often, making for a very off-putting viewing experience.

Throughout the majority of this film, you're asked to accept the horrible things that the main characters are doing, or just connect with Gardner's young boy on an emotional level, but he's not quite present enough in my opinion. Not until the third act do you really fin yourself caring about some of the characters, which was too late for me. This movie tries far too hard to be clever, funny, and surprising, that it just comes off as forced more often than not. You will find yourself along for a ride of random events and you won't really know who to root for.

I may seem to be ripping this film apart for being un even, but for throughout all its flaws, there are actually quite a few great aspects, especially the sequence involving an appearance by Oscar Isaac. There is a lengthy scene when secrets are revealed and characters begin to evolve and Oscar Isaac elevated every moment of this portion of the film. Up until that point, there really weren't any characters to grasp onto, but the environment around them, along with the sets and the score, always helped to make the film feel more authentic than what its screenplay was presenting. This may sound confusing, but that's due to the fact that this is a very confusing watch, and I feel that many people will agree with me on that account.

From being written by Joel and Ethan Coen (who's recent track record hasn't really impressed me recently), to being competently directed by George Clooney, to having racial undertones to help give the film depth, to showcasing some great moments of comedy, Suburbicon just feels like a huge missed opportunity, due to the talent involved. Matt Damon and Julianne Moore deliver solid performances here and the score by Alexandre Desplat is definitely what sucked me into this movie, even throughout the moments that annoyed me. In the end, I feel as though the positives slightly outweigh the negatives, so I can generously give it a pass. This is about as average as you can get in terms of having a clever setting and premise, only to never fully deliver on either front. Suburbicon isn't quite worth seeing in theatres, but it may please hardcore fans of the Coen brother's past work.

It's not a terrible movie like a lot of people are saying, not at all.

But it feels unfinished. Like they had too many ideas and couldn't decide which way to go with things, so they tried it all. And what could have been a modern classic turned into a movie that I probably won't remember in a few months.

And that's a shame.

I was postponing watching this film several times because of the low note here - currently at 5.5

However, I would give this film a rating 7 as I think it was interesting and entertaining from the beginning til the end. Beginning with two Juliennes was kinda funny. I think it was really clever to not know from the beginning what has happened at the dinner/night scene. I admit it got me curious and not many films make me think anything.

The whole black family thing ...well, I am from Europe, so we do not have those 'tensions' which also are showing in comments of people here - so I will not say anything particular about it - only that it did not serve a big purpose in the film in my opinion.

For me, the film is quite good.

1950s America is often mythologised as a period both boring and socially cohesive, before things became interesting and decisive in the following decade. And today, there seems to be a entire sub-genre of films interested less in telling the truth than in playing with the myth. 'Suburbicon' is one such movie, a satire of a view of the world that surely no-one takes at face value anymore. The script is by the Coen brothers, and as such, it's a typical black comedy, quite cleverly worked but without much of a heart. For example, racism is a theme, but the film doesn't really feel very angry about racism, more amused with the direct juxtaposition of the very real racism of the period with the idyllic fantasy of suburban life. There's nothing particularly wrong with George Clooney's direction; but no great sense that the film has anything in particular to say.

I have a policy that I won't watch a movie unless it has an IMDB rating of 6 or more. With a 5.7 rating, I almost gave this movie a wide berth.

That is, until I learned the Cohen brothers wrote this, George Clooney directed, and of course it's difficult to not enjoy any Matt Damon flick -,period.

Near impossible to walk away from all that - no?

I'm so glad I chose to ignore the 5.7 rating. Everything is teriffic, wonderful script, director doesn't dominate the direction and the kid is sublime. Stole the show,

Matt Damon doesn't disappoint either.

Was gonna give this a solid 8 but I'll change to 9 to nudge to 6+ where it deserves to be.

WATCH IT - YOU WON'T REGRET !!