The White King

This is a low budget, low-action, dystopian recycled story, apparently filmed in or near Hungary, with good british acting. I don't recommend it, even to dystopia fans. It's STAND BY ME meets 1984 / HANDMAID'S TALE et al. There's little there, there.

This follows a family living in a totalitarian dystopia.

This is a hard film for me to review.

First off, its production is very good. The camera work and direction is great. The characters are very well constructed and the acting is absolutely top notch. The world is quickly and deftly painted using iconography and suggestion. The world is oppressive but not overly brutal making it feel more real and dangerous. I enjoyed every minute of the first hour greatly and was gripped to see what was going to happen.

Here is the problem. Not much does happen. This film has plenty of story, but hardly any plot. Characters are introduced, and adversities befall our leads, but very little is resolved or explored. Any small victories the characters win aren't exploited.

The only analogy I can think of is if you made a film about a waitress who works in a bar in Star Wars. Sure dancing girls are fed to monsters and Jedi come in - but at the end of the day you are still watching someone serve drinks.

Maybe it is my personal taste, I thought I was more open minded than this, but it seems I do need a certain degree of resolution.

I kept the mark high because of the quality of the film making - not sure if I would recommend it though.

I enjoyed this new film and also, as a small rule, I am generally really interested to see new directors'/producers work. Especially when the is a dearth of good stuff coming out of the established US/UK areas, well picked Edinburgh Film Festival!

It was interesting and although one can see allusions, references etc to established works such as Orwell, Huxley and so on - well they do say there are only 7 stories in the world! - this is a new take on it.

Loved the the boy lead actor, and Deyn (who I thought surprisingly good and natural) loved the cinematography and the story of a (particularly relevant today) dystopian society, there were others that also stood out, although I was a little surprised to see De Lint who I have not seen for a very long time on the big screen.

Moody and thought provoking with one or two touches of brilliance. Not perfect (a first film n.b.) but the fact that I was engaged throughout says it all.

Really, it's a bit an empty movie. Some great shots, clearly the crew is capable, but the movie as it's edited just doesn't go anywhere. 90 minutes of wasted time. It carries the potential to so much more but never really delivers. If you watch it, do it for the esthetics. For the movie in its entirety it is not particularly worth the time.

Potential. But I think it failed to convert from the book into a film. The backdrop with violent kids just rampaging, and no one paying attention to that, to the ending that offered nothing. I have no idea what the film was wanting to achieve. I think they wanted to make this a triple series but maybe realised it was just weak material and gave up. either that or the editor is owed his or her $500 fee and withheld the last 20 minutes of the film. Watch it or not it is one of those that won't make a difference. Sad really, had a lot of potential in there. I think you could have gone to 20 random people in the street and they could have made that 50% better