The Lobster

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source: The Lobster

This has got to be hands down the worst piece or rubbish I have ever seen.It was cringe worthy how they tried to make it arty but it turned out to be pretentious tripe. Anyone giving it good reviews are just trying to look intelligent as if to say 'Oh yeah I get it' When there really is nothing to get. It was just awful strung together, boring crud.I don't know how they managed to get such good names to sign up to this movie, really that is all it has going for it. I think without the names this movie would not have been seen by anyone. Do yourself a favour and give this one a big miss. By the way I do like indie movies and i do like art house movies, I am not some philistine who doesn't appreciate good art and fringe cinema, but this was truly bad.

We went into this movie with high hopes for some sort of absurdist black comedy, as it's being billed - and as many reviewers have described it. Instead, we were treated to an overlong, pretentious art project that felt more like an undergraduate student film created by an emotionally stunted sophomore. All the actor's lines are delivered deadpan, with no emotion, regardless of the situation. There is are a few (very minor) chuckles to be sure, but they hardly compensate for the overall deadly serious tone. It's dreary, poorly edited, and contains some revolting scenes involving violent death and extreme animal cruelty. Truly terrible and a waste of a great cast. Spoiler: The ending is.

A kitchen sink of arbitrary ideas. The director is just throwing crap against the wall and seeing what sticks. The story is based on a feeble and unconvincing premise. Anyone who fails to stay in committed relationships is turned into an animal. What?? When did the society care so much for everyone to be with a partner? The motivations of individual characters are just as uncompelling as the obstacles they are "forced" to overcome. Depictions of cruelty come from a desperate desire to move the story that is dead in the water and does not self-propel. I watched quite a bit of self-centered, pseudo-profound European movies in my youth; I never thought something like that would fly here. Miraculously it does. If this is a trend, we are in for some ugly, sad cinematic dystopia.

While the film was creative in it setting and filming, the strange dialogue, which helped set a tone, made the interpersonal relationships seem completely forced even when they should not have seemed that way. The worst part is that I watched it until it stopped. It is as if the film maker didn't have an ending to go to, and just go tired of the movie. Unfortunately, that took a long time. As a short, this film might have been remarkable. As a full length feature, it was just tedious and not entertaining. On the positive side, it had a great cast who probably did as much as they could with the material they were given. Yorgos Lanthimos wrote, directed and produced the movie and I'm unlikely to want to go see another movie by Yorgos. It was billed as a wickedly funny romance, but was none of those. I did laugh once. It was a single "ha", not a "ha, ha, ha!" Ultimately a waste of time.