Abigail

Good film, liked the over all look and style. BUT everyone in the film is clearly speaking english as speech matches mouth movements yet everyone is dubbed in annoyingly unrealistic voices that don't match their character at all. I don't understand why they do this I would much rather someone speaking English with their native accent than the weird disembodied voices they have, made the film difficult to watch and take seriously and spoiled it massively. Would have given up and switched off if kid didn't seem to be enjoying it.

The story telling is falling into pieces and all the points are hardly connected. Story progress are so confusing and so hard to catch up. I personally thinks that there is something wrong with the storyboard that makes the movie losing their main focus in almost every scene. Character dialogues are so clear without sufficient environment noise, makes them sound like a voice-over. The created music are good but the volume are so constant throughout the movie. However, kudos to the VFX team who tries their best to work on the film. The effects are actually quite good, but it cannot save this movie with other elements fall so behind.

"Abigail" is a Russian fantasy-adventure film with a good story and magnificent special effects. The director Aleksandr Boguslavskiy is absolutelly unknown for Western audiences and uses the surrealistic style of French directors Marc Caro and Jean-Pierre Jeunet on "La cité des enfants perdus" (1995), a.k.a. "The City of Lost Children". The huge buildings are typical in Eastern Europe and the city recalls a guetto in World War II. The authorities look like nazi officers and the epidemic that closes the borders of the city recalls most of the societies with the COVID-19 pandemic in the present days. The magic is a twist in the storyline and the flying machine is original. In the end, "Abigail" is neither a masterpiece nor what the IMDb reviews describe, but an entertaining movie for fans of the genre. My vote is six.

Title (Brazil): "Abigail e a Cidade Proibida" ("Abigail and the Forbidden City")

Ok, let's start with the good points...

1. Eddie Marsen - best actor in this film by a country mile 2. Visuals and cinematography are good.

Now the bad...

1. The dialogue is absolutely awful - no sentence of more than about 5 words and each line is spoken/shouted with really strange intonations. Seems to be dubbed and/or spoken by actors who just don't know what they are saying in English. 2. The script - a lot of the time it just does make any sense e.g. someone saying they don;t understand something when they were told it 5 minutes previously! Did anyone listen to this before it was released!! 3. All the acting (apart from Eddie Marsen of course) was wooden: no character or personality - they just barked each line of the script at each other in pseudo English (usually in a petulant manner for no obvious reason). 4. The story - apart from the start and end it simply lacked a clear direction for the most part.

In short, Eddie Marsen's great, visuals are good but if you speak English then this will be a painful experience.

The overall storyline and visual effects are pretty good, but it is unfortunately let down every time a character speaks.

The terribly unauthentic dubbing detracts so much that it's almost cringeworthy to watch.

Whilst the concept and direction of the story is really good, it could have been fleshed out so much more. Character development was also lacking or rushed as a result, with the dialogue feeling awkward or confusing throughout. Eddie Marsan and his character were the only ones saved of this. Sad to see the missed opportunities here though.

But if you can get past the dubbing/dialogue, then this really is worth watching.