As if we needed more proof: cool special effects are fun to watch for a while, but if you don’t have an original or interesting story to tell, you have no movie. And even if the first half-hour is jaw-dropping, the remaining three half-hours simply hurt your ass. There is only one truly neato concept in “Night Watch,” but it hit me mid-way through that it is stolen from “Lord of the Rings” (how is entering “The Gloom” not the same as when Frodo puts on the Ring?) Some groovy shots, yeah — I certainly recommend this to anyone on drugs who wants to see cool images. And props must go out to whomever decided that the English subtitles should move around the screen, fade in and out, turn red, change size, etc. (I think using subtitles as a quasi-diagetic graphic element is basically without precedent.) But I won’t be lining up for the sequels.
2 Comments
Welcome
Jordan Hoffman is a New York-based writer and film critic working for The Guardian, Vanity Fair, Thrillist, Times of Israel, NY Daily News and elsewhere.
He is the host of ENGAGE: The Official Star Trek Podcast, a member of the New York Film Critics Circle and challenges you to a game of backgammon.
I may be wrong – but I seem to remember that denzel washington movie where he’s a bodyguard for Dakota Fanning (Man on Fire) used animated subtitles.
Didn’t Ocean’s Twelve use them too?
I didn’t see Man on Fire. I saw Ocean’s 12 recently, but don’t remember animated subtitles, but that sounds like something that would be in there.
The subtitles in Night Watch are flyin’ all over the place, changing color, fading out. . .it is wild.