O Silêncio da Cidade Branca

Well, I already knew the story, because I read the book recently. Sure, the expectations were high.

I tried to ignore the bad reviews, and watched the movie anyway. Well, they are right. The thing is, I don't understand why they didn't do a TV series, like they did with the book of Joël Dicker, " The Harry Quebert's Affair".

If you didn't read the book, you will find the movie just a mediocre thriller. But for someone like me who read the book, he or she will be really disappointed. The identity of the killer is revealed too soon in the movie, and I couldn't find any interest for that decision.

And if we analyze the acting, it is really poor. The choice of the two main characters is bad. Sure, you can make some changes when you adapt a book to the screen, but there are some important things, some characteristics, that were not respected! It seems to me that they wanted to use the success of the book to make a movie, but the result is not good!!!

If I were the writer of the book, I think I would be mad but mostly disappointed.

Whoever edited this movie should be fired immediately. What could have been a decent Da Vinci-style mystery was turned into a mess due to bad direction or bad editing or both.

To explain, you barely know what is going on or why. It appears some very key scenes were deleted which caused the story to be disjointed. Too often you would see a police at a suspect's house but you never saw the information or clue that led them there. One scene the police are looking at a newspaper clipping, next they are knocking down doors without explaining what they saw or why. There are many illiogicla time jumps, such as jogging in the middle of the night and somehow it is bright sunlight and they are jogging.

There is a movie somewhere hidden in this if you can decipher the mess.

This Spanish thriller is centred on the hunt for a serial killer; each time he strikes he kills two people; one male one female. Each pair of victims is from a wealthy family and five years older than the previous pair. His crimes mirror those that happened twenty years previously; the man accused of those crimes is in prison but is due to be released soon. Policeman Unai López de Ayala, a skilled profiler, is put in charge of the case; his first since returning to work after the death of his wife. He works alongside younger female officer Estíbaliz Ruiz de Gauna.

I enjoyed this film although in the already crowded serial killer genre it doesn't feel enormously original. There are some nice ideas such as there being pairs of victims each time and a disturbing yet novel method of murder. We are told the identity of the killer, and their connection to somebody close to our protagonist fairly early on so there isn't really a mystery about who is doing it; just a question of why, and how they will ultimately be stopped. I liked our two investigators; Javier Rey and Aura Garrido impress in these roles. The rest of the cast are pretty solid too. Everything looks good with impressive locations; both indoors and outside. Overall a decent enough addition to the genre; not a must see but still worth a watch... just don't expect it to be up there with 'The Silence of the Lambs'.

These comments are based on watching the film in Spanish with English subtitles.

The trailer promised oh so much but the film failed to deliver. The gothic surround centering on the lover themed murders was impressive along with the scenery but the characters and acting fell flat. You knew who the killer was from a early stage, it was a case of seeing how the main characters wove into his sick plans. The murders were very predictable with no change in his method of execution. There has been some excellent Spanish Crime Films over the last decade sadly this didn't fit into that category. Netflix best work has been international Film &TV this let the side down a bit.

I've noticed that the terrible reviews seem to come from people watching the dubbed version of films on Netflix. The lazy or stupid who cannot read subtitles have no clue as to the true storytelling and acting presented to them.

This is no Silence Of The Lambs, but well worth of watching if one can actually read subtitles while viewing.