Force of Nature: Oltre l'inganno

I rather liked The Dry, although I didn't rate it (or the book on which it was based) as much as most Australians, so I had quite high hopes for this one.

Alas, they were dashed almost as soon as the film began. The overblown, portentous music was set my Dud Alert quivering, and it was all downhill from there. Ridiculously over complicated plot with about four separate strand running at once, none of which were really resolved satisfactorily, and a couple of them not at all. I pitied the actors who had to deliver what must be some of the clunkiest lines of dialogue ever written, and perhaps the poor quality of the screenplay explains why the performances were so uniformly poor; even Eric Bana, who's an excellent actor, is terrible in this.

Just don't bother. There are far better ways to spend your time.

A sequel to 2021's sleeper hit The Dry, Force Of Nature: The Dry 2 once again follows brooding detective Aaron Falk where after his informant (Anna Torov) gets lost in the forest on a work retreat he joins a search and rescue team to help find her. Along the way he's forced to confront more of his childhood trauma.

Unfortunately the title for this movie sets the stage for what is a pretty convoluted and muddled movie and is overall a step down in my opinion compared to the first. There are three competing storylines here, the group of women, Aaron's trauma from his past and a serial killer subplot that literally goes nowhere. All of these storylines compete for attention but in the end they all end up falling flat. Also with the exception of Eric Bana as Falk almost every other character in this movie is unlikable (with maybe the only other exception being Mortal Kombat's Sisi Stringer.) With so much going on here it's surprising how unsatisfying and bland this movie was. Five stars for Bana though who is pretty much the only reason this might be worth your time.

Jane Harper wrote a third and final Aaron Falk book that was published last year so I feel like it's inevitable that it also gets adapted to make a trilogy out of this. Hopefully it's more in line with the first movie compared to this and it can finally give Bana's Aaron Falk some sense of happiness because the amount of past and present trauma he's endured throughout both Dry movies is kind of crazy.

5 women embark on a company team building exercise, backpacking for 3 days into the forest. However only 4 return and a search is quickly launched for the 5th, Alice, played by the excellent Anna Torv. Enter detective Falk (Eric Bana) who needs to find Alice as she has been working undercover in the company for Falk in an attempt to expose fraud by bad guy Daniel Bailey (Richard Roxburgh).

Sequel to 'The Dry', which whilst not as good as the original is still an enjoyable watch. What director Robert Connolly does is to almost seamlessly intertwine Falk's investigation with flashbacks to what the group did. In most films this is done in large chunks, but here it moves more quickly, neatly shifting from one timeline to the other merging them into one. The 5 women make for a good team playing nicely off each other, mixing truth and lies to Falk and us, with Bana solid and sincere, thinking back to backpacking in his youth which lead to a tragedy and Roxburgh, ideal as the cocky slime ball. Worth catching.

Not as good as the first film ...I think , mainly because the missing lady , was annoying and unpleasant , just couldn't feel anything for her ... Otherwise , not bad ...Kind of satisfied the urge I have lately to return to the old fashioned style of cinematography , when films were more about character development and acting than special effects and non stop action . This film ,definitely , achieves that : there was almost no violence or fights or car chases, or , for that matter -casual nudity or sex . That's why for me it was a pleasant reminder of the days once and for all gone ... I mean , I love some crazy action , but sometimes just want to sit quietly and enjoy a bit of a cerebral thriller )

A significant Australian made hit in early 2021, The Dry was both a critical and commercial success as the tale of Eric Bana's softly spoken federal agent Aaron Falk returning to his isolated hometown to help solve a murder of an old friend resonated across a wide spanning film going community, with many thankful that author Jane Harper's creation had more coming for them with her book series having multiple Falk entries planned.

A victim of last years Hollywood strike that saw its August 2023 release postponed until recent weeks, Force of Nature: The Dry 2 (an unfortunate title if there ever was one for multiple reasons) finally arrives with Bana and director Robert Connolly on board once more but sadly this time around much of the goodwill and good work that the first Dry entry left us with is gone here on a drab and damp next instalment that makes one wonder if Falk's cinematic adventures are going to be short-lived from here on out.

Far removed from the dusty and dried out surrounds of the first film, Nature finds the sleepwalking Bana and new zombified version of Falk venturing out into the Victorian mountain ranges to help with the search efforts for Anna Torv's Alice, an informant of Falk's who has gone missing in the rugged wilds during a corporate retreat that includes such colleagues as Deborra-Lee Furness's Jill, Robin McLeavy's Lauren and Richard Roxburgh's shady CEO Daniel and while the landscape we and Falk find ourselves in now have a flavour and energy, much of what happens in this wannabe Agatha Christie-lite tale is far from engaging.

Suffering from a central mystery that isn't entirely gripping and a procedural that is like a robotic progression of ticking a few boxes before climaxing in a far from memorable fashion, the core of Nature's problems stem directly from the material it's adapting and Connolly and Bana's inability to infuse that with any extra movie magic that would have made this well-budgeted Australian production anything but a pretty but extremely minor distraction.

The Dry found success in its mix of cinematic qualities rarely found in local productions, interesting main and side characters and a murder mystery that gripped from the first frame, all ingredients that aren't found in Nature, with the film failing to ever engage to a high level as we trudge along our way through mostly dialogue themed interactions with a bunch of fairly unlikeable and undeveloped characters we come to care very little about.

Initially set up to be what could have been an iconic new addition to Australian cinema history it's sad to see Falk the character and Bana the performer with so little to do here and despite some attempts to create more engagement through flashbacks and one of the most bizarre serial killer subplots I can recall, the story of Falk and his future potential don't seem so appealing moving forward after a bright initial start.

Final Say -

Well-filmed and full of possibilities, Force of Nature: The Dry 2 is a nothing more than major step backwards from the original 2021 outing and a mediocre effort from all involved, potentially halting the cinematic universe of Aaron Falk in its tracks.

2 hazardous waterfalls out of 5.

Jordan and Eddie (The Movie Guys)