Pequena Grande Vida

Very much a movie of 2 halves. The first half is an interesting, funny and thoughtful look at what 'downsizing' is and its implications and seemed to set up what could have been an excellent movie. However, the second half goes off at a tangent and starts to explore something completely different - and not in a good way. The whole second half has little reference to the titular 'downsizing' concept and whole sections could have been cut out of it without affecting the movie. Left me feeling disappointed as it could have been very good.

I wouldn't describe this movie as a comedy. Actually, the script touches a very important topic in my opinion. The trailer only showcases the first half of the movie, but all the exciting stuff comes after that. I would say this movie is actually about more than the fun aspect of being able to live life at a perspective from 10 centimeters tall. It's about the way life can be cruel, love and making decisions. Nice movie, absolutely worth the watch.

This came up on my Prime feed for watching after a hard day of work.

At first, the concept was intriguing and compelling. Solve some of the worlds problems with overpopulation and resource straining by allowing people to be "downsized" to approximately 5 inches, or roughly the same size as an action hero doll. There is even a "Truman" style all-encompassing village for them all to live in luxury in downsized mansions that would fit onto a real life dining table.

The leads, Matt Damon and Kristen Wiig, are always bankable for bringing interesting characters to life, and the whole downsizing process for Matt Damon is breathtaking. That all happens in roughly the first half of the movie, but things go downhill fast after Christoph Waltz enters the picture as Matt Damon's obnoxious upstairs neighbor.

First off, earlier scenes show the Matt Damon character, "Paul" taking up residence in one of the Lilliputian mansions with his own yard around it. However, he later appears to live in some type of highrise with elevators without any explanation of why he moved (or maybe I missed it).

By the time the Paul character helps an Asian refugee and ends up visiting the "slum" of the small people neighborhoods to help a disadvantaged small person, I found myself clicking on the screen to see how much of the movie was left. Forty-five minutes? Ugh.

So chalk it up to bad execution or bad scriptwriting, but to me there's little wonder why the movie failed massively at the box office, reaping only a fraction of its production costs, bloated because of the breathtaking special effects from the first half. Eventually, I may see the final 45 minutes since Prime allows you to pick up where you left off, but I certainly won't go out of my way to do it!

From Sideways, to Nebraska, to The Descendants, and even Paris, je t'aime, I've pretty much loved everything that I've seen from director Alexander Payne, making Downsizing one of my most anticipated films of 2017. Having heard so little about the film aside from its concept, I went into the screening fairly cold. Sadly, the film doesn't have a whole lot more to offer than its brilliant concept and exceptional first act. I must admit that I left feeling disappointed, thinking they could've made this a better movie in many ways. When a film has so much promise and doesn't exactly deliver on much of it, I feel as though many people would be let down by that. Here is why I believe everyone should see Downsizing, despite it being slightly too mediocre as a final product.

In this dramedy, which also in part a social satire of its own genre, Downsizing follows a couple who believes their lives would be better if they were to shrink themselves and be transferred to a new world called Leisureland. This place exists to conserve the Earth and save the environment, by these shrunken people needed much fewer resources. With multiple meanings to the title, this is a concept that sounds incredible on paper but doesn't exactly translate into that great of a movie. Throughout the first act, I found myself immersed in this world and couldn't wait to be taken on its journey, but I soon found myself losing interest when political and religious elements began to take over. This is a movie that could've done so much more with its premise.

Without giving anything away, there are many characters that come in and out of this film in a heartbeat, pretty much leaving them in the dust, when in reality they were actually interesting and added a layer to the overall story. It felt as though Alexander Payne wanted to focus so much on the idea of the Downsizing concept, that he sidelined quite a few characters along the way. His films have always been about characters, and while Paul (Matt Damon) and Ngoc (Hong Chau) share some great chemistry throughout this film, it's hard not to wish that all of the characters throughout the first act were present throughout the entire film. This was a very curious issue I had while watching and definitely upon reflection.

As soon as you're brought into this other world that has been built for those who shrunk themselves over the years, you will find yourself kind of transfixed at how interesting the visuals are and how well the comedic aspects come into play, but what you don't expect is for the film to take a dramatic turn and really have you thinking hard about the world we live in and whether or not certain lines of dialogue are true about society in general. This is an eye-opening film in that regard and the third act is incredibly ambitious, but I just don't think it really sticks the landing that it strives to achieve.

In the end, this is one of the most original ideas I can recall in recent memory, but an idea doesn't make a film great. It's the film itself that needs to win you over as a whole, and Downsizing just didn't do that for me. On many accounts, this is a very impressive movie from a technical standpoint and it takes risks that I didn't expect it to, but the risks it takes will only work for a few audiences members that can relate to it.

This is a movie that promises a lot and tries to deliver on all of those promises, while also shoving in side plots that make this film too emotionally complex to really be invested in the satirical aspects by the end. I wish this film went through a few more rewrites, because there is a satirical masterpiece of a movie in here somewhere, but it's just not the product that you'll be seeing in theatres soon. Downsizing is worth your time in terms of originality, but I wouldn't get your hopes up on it being a favorite of yours.

After seeing "Downsizing" I now understand where the bad reviews originate from. This movie was marketed to the masses as a funny miniature movie, while it's message of how to deal with global warming, is probably only engaging for an arthouse movie crowd. It is truly an intelligent, righteous, thought provoking and caring movie. Like ALL movies from director Alexander Payne are.

But however good (7 stars) this picture might be, lots of people went to see it expecting something entirely different. Just to avoid more frustrations based on the wrong expectations, I have made a short list by which you can check if this movie will annoy you depending on your expactations. You probably WONT be pleased if you are someone who doesnt believe global warming is caused by oil and coal companies that burn fossil fuels in massive quantities. It is though. 98% of the climate scientists say so, based on decades of research. You WONT be pleased either if you are expecting a fun movie with Kristen Wiig because she only performs a meager 10-15 minutes. You WONT be pleased either if you expect a straight story with Matt Damon whom you so admire from his Jason Bourne actionhero movies. Because in "Downsizing" Matt Damon plays a humble and sensitive normal person, who wants to take care of poor and foreign people in need. You WONT be pleased either if you are expecting a funny miniature movie. It is NOT about that at all.

"Downsizing" is ALL about global warming and the dangers it exposes to us as humans. And it is about the choices we can make. It truly is a unique piece of work. Hilarious at only a few moments, because it is not a real comedy. Jokes are made tongue in cheek, in a satirical way. That sort of humor/drama isnt understood by the masses. This movie is really intelligent and heartwarming. But what it really is, is baffling. Because "Downsizing" depicts OUR world. We live in it. We have responsibilities to act upon the dangers global warming exposes our children to. We can choose to make a difference. Or we can stay indifferent.

"Downsizing" is a mirror to our consumer society which runs on oil and coal and if we dont act soon the CO2 emissions will destroy the world as we know it through global warming. I love people who dare hold up mirrors to our society at large. Most people dont like to be told something is wrong with the way we live nowadays however. Alexander Payne is one of the very few directors who dared to try to hold this mirror up to our way of life. I recommend this picture VERY MUCH to all those who DO wanna care about our children's future, who DO wanna care about stopping global warming. These pictures are very rare nowadays, but we need them NOW more than ever before...

It took Alexander Payne 10 years to get this movie made, because the subject of the story is not very popular. It is certainly not his best work, but it is his most RELEVANT one. Because in the end we all have to ask ourselves the question WHAT we can do to guarantee a prosperous and safe future for our very own children and grandchildren. This picture was director Alexander Payne's most personal one. He dedicated it to his late father George, who died on the very day this movie premiered...