It seems ridiculous to compare a typical but sub-standard Woody Allen film with a big-budget, somewhat melodramatic Steven Spielberg epic. What on earth is there to compare, apart from the fact that I saw the two on the same day, the former at the cinema and the latter on TV?
In actual fact there really is nothing to compare. Allen's film is an example of an entertainment that one views without boredom and even with a certain degree of amusement but one that has sunk without trace five minutes after leaving the cinema. War Horse, on the other hand and despite its imperfections, sticks in the mind and I find myself wondering what might happen to the main protagonists afterwards. If nothing else, this shows that Spielberg, like the good story-teller he is, has succeeded in gripping my attention and exciting my imagination.
In actual fact there really is nothing to compare. Allen's film is an example of an entertainment that one views without boredom and even with a certain degree of amusement but one that has sunk without trace five minutes after leaving the cinema. War Horse, on the other hand and despite its imperfections, sticks in the mind and I find myself wondering what might happen to the main protagonists afterwards. If nothing else, this shows that Spielberg, like the good story-teller he is, has succeeded in gripping my attention and exciting my imagination.
There's truth there.
ReplyDeleteI can't remember a single Woody Allen film I've ever seen, though have this half memory of being rather bored.
Spielberg, on the other hand, while often being very annoying leaves big memories as well as questions.
Have you seen Lincoln? This is not an "easy" film to watch for a variety of reasons but the aftermath certainly lingers. But then again, Daniel Day Lewis ........
Greetings Barnaby
ReplyDeleteI have not seen the play or film "War Horse" but you might be interested in comment about the play in yesterday's Evening Standard:
"in September 2015 the National Theatre’s iconic production of War Horse will open in China, playing in Beijing and in Shanghai, and then on tour all over the country. The War Horse team, along with their puppets, have been out there already for some months, working alongside actors and puppeteers from the National Theatre of China.
The production will be entirely acted, spoken and sung in Chinese. This is the first time the two National Theatres will have collaborated in this way, and marks the beginning of a new strategic partnership, a milestone in the relationship between our two cultures and our two peoples.
Remarkable though this is, it is not the first time that War Horse has trotted out and jumped cultural fences around the world. Neither is it an accident that the play, seemingly so British in its context, has been so warmly welcomed wherever it has been seen. It may be set against the background of the First World War and involve just three of the dozens of nations that were involved in the conflict — France, Germany and Britain — but it is readily understood by... "