Personally, I was greatly disappointed by "Octav".
The movie enjoyed tremendous publicity and marketing support across all media. Naturally, this only built up the curiosity and the expectations of the public. However, all of this excitement collapses once the movie is seen, as it does not live up to its hype.
Why? Because despite the fact that the casting includes A-list actors, only the main actor, Marcel Iures, actually gets some screen time. The rest, such as Victor Rebengiuc, Andi Vasluianu, Dana Rogoz, get to play incredibly small parts with relatively restrained screening time. Thus, the viewer does not get the chance to see a proper performance from these actors, and, more importantly, the viewer is not offered the chance to see a reasonable character development. Instead, the movie focuses only on the main character and to such a great extent that it becomes annoying and, to be honest, dull.
Moreover, the entire movie is very chopped up, segmented, broken and then confusingly reassembled. Without giving away any spoilers, I can describe the movie as a mix of various segments of the main character's life. While this is a nice technique, unfortunately, the director chose a confusing order for the segments to be patched up: he threw in present-day episodes, then childhood memories, then again present-day segments, he then mixes childhood and present-day segments, then one, incredibly random teenage segment, then again childhood, then present-day and so on. This results in a broken movie, lacking a logical structure, some easy-to-follow narrative. The effect is that the viewer is thrown into pure ambiguity and misunderstanding, becoming tired of trying to keep up with all these different segments.
Lastly, I was also left with the sensation that the director tried to milk some emotions as much as possible from some rather okay, unimpressive scenes. There is one scene where two of the characters play and laugh. Unfortunately, it goes on way beyond its natural running time, that it becomes cringe-worthy and obviously staged and unnatural. Simply put, the over-zealous desire of creating something poetic destroys the simplicity and beauty of the act. Sometimes, less is more.
All in all, the movie feels like an incipient draft which needs further work. It could have used more attention to the dialogue, more character development, improved storyline. Sadly, I was left with the impression that something better, more put-together could have been created.
The movie enjoyed tremendous publicity and marketing support across all media. Naturally, this only built up the curiosity and the expectations of the public. However, all of this excitement collapses once the movie is seen, as it does not live up to its hype.
Why? Because despite the fact that the casting includes A-list actors, only the main actor, Marcel Iures, actually gets some screen time. The rest, such as Victor Rebengiuc, Andi Vasluianu, Dana Rogoz, get to play incredibly small parts with relatively restrained screening time. Thus, the viewer does not get the chance to see a proper performance from these actors, and, more importantly, the viewer is not offered the chance to see a reasonable character development. Instead, the movie focuses only on the main character and to such a great extent that it becomes annoying and, to be honest, dull.
Moreover, the entire movie is very chopped up, segmented, broken and then confusingly reassembled. Without giving away any spoilers, I can describe the movie as a mix of various segments of the main character's life. While this is a nice technique, unfortunately, the director chose a confusing order for the segments to be patched up: he threw in present-day episodes, then childhood memories, then again present-day segments, he then mixes childhood and present-day segments, then one, incredibly random teenage segment, then again childhood, then present-day and so on. This results in a broken movie, lacking a logical structure, some easy-to-follow narrative. The effect is that the viewer is thrown into pure ambiguity and misunderstanding, becoming tired of trying to keep up with all these different segments.
Lastly, I was also left with the sensation that the director tried to milk some emotions as much as possible from some rather okay, unimpressive scenes. There is one scene where two of the characters play and laugh. Unfortunately, it goes on way beyond its natural running time, that it becomes cringe-worthy and obviously staged and unnatural. Simply put, the over-zealous desire of creating something poetic destroys the simplicity and beauty of the act. Sometimes, less is more.
All in all, the movie feels like an incipient draft which needs further work. It could have used more attention to the dialogue, more character development, improved storyline. Sadly, I was left with the impression that something better, more put-together could have been created.