Lost in London

Woody Harrelson comes off the stage in another mediocre London West End theatre production. Over the course of the evening his marriage to his wife (Eleanor Satsuura) breaks down due to an indisctrion which makes its way to the front page of a tabloid, but after an apparent fight with friend Owen Wilson he leaves a nightclub and gets into an altercation with a taxi driver that lands him in jail.

A piece of experiemental cinema whereby the film was shot in real time and streamed to a live cinema audience in the USA and then the UK on the 19th January 2017. The idea is incredibly bold and well executed with some aspects of the film working very well, others less so. Modern technology and smaller GoPro type cameras have allowed for this type of film to be executed, but it is also well choreographed. For this alone, Harrelson should be praised.

Harrelson directs and stars in this experimental film where the whole thing was shot live in one night and screened into cinemas. The story, such as it is, features Harrelson playing 'himself' falling out with his wife and get into various mishaps as he tries to get back to her.

As a film, it's pretty slight, although Harrelson is very good as the witty, lost, selfish and naive film star lost in the big city. There are some fun scenes and some dull bits - Harrelson's row with Owen Wilson where they rip each other's films apart is wonderful. All this though takes a back seat to appreciating the quite incredible skills in pulling this together, as far as I can tell, without a mistake, whilst keeping pace and solid performances going.

If this were viewed Live, my reaction might be a little different. This is a single camera project that is nothing new to anything genre, and although the imagery flowed there were a few awkward moments with the characters. I kept expecting James Corden to pop up to do a Carpool Karaoke scene-actually, this film could have been condensed into a James Corden Carpool Karaoke video.

Even after watching the Q and A for the film I still can't figure out why someone would have their directorial debut be the most challenging project I can imagine undertaking. Even without the single shot, live elements, the film is written and performed hilariously. I had more laugh out loud moments in the theater with this film than I can remember in recent history. After the film, the cast and crew presented a Q and A that really makes you feel like you are part of the process, which I guess we were. Willie Nelson was a surreal fantasy for both Woody and the audience. Owen Wilson was a great as usual and the self deprecating humor Woody Nelson threw in about his career as well as Wilsons, was lovingly harsh and very funny. There were some inconsistencies with the cultural and film references being post 2002 when the film supposedly takes place, but they didn't really place it in that time period until the end of the film so it wasn't distracting or obvious and didn't detract. It was fantastic as an experience and was a genuinely delightful film.

I didn't know this was a "one shot" live movie. For what it is, it's well executed and deserving of praise, however, it falls short if you expect it to stand its own ground. Maybe if we were rating single take live films, this could be an 8,9 or 10.

The dialogue is painfully intense, there is hardly any space to breathe. Camera is shaky, sometimes blurry... Some of the jokes are witty but they are few and far in between. Also you cannot really laugh as you are trying to understand what the heck is going on and what everyone is talking about. The British accents don't help. Overall interesting try but dont be fooled by the positive reviews, this will eventually become a 5 start movie on IMDB