Good music and a story makes a concept album, not a movie. Imagery makes a movie.

Rating: 2/10 (10 January 2008)

This movie has been getting a lot of attention, and has even made quite a few best-of lists. In a way, it's perfectly understandable: this movie is about music, it has good music, and mostly importantly, the good music it has is about the emotional ambiance of the characters, something that can be totally felt from the music. As an inspirational art-piece, it allows the creative desire for music and the expressiveness of music to wash through the viewer.
However, I'm a film critic. I admit that sometimes that means that I have quips with a movie that possibly don't deserve it. Sometimes I worry about craft and function where it doesn't matter, where the point is only to tell the story or relate a certain sensibility, which is what I gather this movie is trying to do. But let's face it, as a movie, this movie sucks. The music is wonderful, and with a few bits of the dialog thrown in it would make an interesting narrative concept album. At any rate, it's quite the audio experience. It's visual aspect, however, goes beyond "leaving a lot to ask for". Its cinematic-ness, the visual storytelling of it, is completely inept.
Here's the thing: it's a cheap production with hand-held cameras, but that's not why it's bad: it's bad because the production never rises above its limitations. Almost 60% of this film seems to be the camera-person just trying to find a place to set the camera so that the image doesn't just sit static or eventually become boring. You know, a good cut could possibly help, but unfortunately the filmmakers are much more interested in long takes, long takes that basically involve shifting perspective for no real reason but that they suddenly realize "oh, oops, this is a movie, better get a different angle." Forget actually setting up a scene or telling a story visually--this movie lays its emphasis so much on the music and dialog that almost all of it doesn't have to be watched at all, only listened to.
And that is what I consider to be inappropriate. A movie about music can rely on its music to make most of its statements--that's fine. A movie that relies on its music to make most of its statements, however, cannot forget that the audience is watching. We need something to look at, something to engage with. I'm not talking fast cuts or unique editing or anything particularly special. I'm talking about something that doesn't involve the cameraman walking the camera from one side of a piano to another. I'm talking about needing some level of craft or design that helps bring the audience into the music instead of making them steadily stop watching the movie and just listening to the music solely. I'm talking figuring out how to express, in imagery, the same feelings the music is supposed to be expressing.
This film doesn't do that, and thus this film fails as a film. The drama and performance is there, but not captured. The beauty and emotion is told, not shown. That is why this is not a very good movie.
--PolarisDiB