Ok, so this will most likely be a new thing on my blog. Whenever I see a film (starting now) i'm going to do a little write up. So, expect more of these.
So, Transsiberian is a little independant film about an American couple that just finishes up a church humanitarian trip to China and is on the way back home. Now, the husband is a train-nut so they decide to take the trans-siberian railroad across Russia. They run into another couple on the train and end up getting stuck in the middle of this drug smuggling operation from one end of Russia to the other.
Now, let me just start this off by saying that this movie is intense. There is very little action (except toward the end) in the film; but I found myself biting my nails and practically screaming at the screen. This movie should have just been called "A Series of Bad Decisions in the Middle of Nowhere." The wife in the couple is possibly the dumbest character in the entire world. I'm pretty sure that Sean Penn from "I Am Sam" could make better decisions. I won't give anything away, but whenever any challenges present themselves the woman just decides to do what no person would ever do. I sat there in the theater with my hands over my face in frustration while she made bad decisions. I couldn't even imagine why she was acting that way. Then I realized what was happening (or this is at least what I think). I think that the reason that she was acting so dumb was to bring in the audience. When someone is acting so irrationally, you can't help but pay attention to what is happening and look at how the situation is unfolding.
Ok, now that that little rant is over, the rest of the film was really good. I couldn't take my eyes away and grew to care about what happened to some of the characters. Something like that is really rare nowadays. Also, Ben Kingsley plays a Russian narcotics investigator and he is amazing. It just reinforces the fact that he can play anyone. In the past he has been everything from a hitman, to a retired Iranian military officer, and now a Russian narcotics officer. Also, I think his next movie has him in a relationship with Penelope Cruz (awesome).
Ok, so now you know that the acting was top notch, and the story was intriguing; but what was lacking? The reason that I can only give this movie ***1/2 stars instead of the **** is because of the stupid choices. I understand that they got me involved in the film and that without those dumb decisions there would be little movie left. It's just that when the stupid decisions happened I got really frustrated. Like Call-of-Duty-4-on-veteran-difficulty frustrated. It is only for this reason that it lost half a star. Other than that, the movie is really solid and I would recommend it to anyone who is interested in seeing a genuinely good thriller.
Beware, film geekery ahead---------------------
Another thing that I really liked about the movie was the use of foreshadowing. There were times where the camera would just linger for a moment on objects and the director did a great job of drawing your attention to things in the movie. Like, did you ever see "Crank." There was that scene where Jason Statham is running through the kitchen and the camera practically stops on the butcher knife. It was there for so long that I was expecting the director to pop up and point at the knife and then make a cutting motion toward his other hand. The cinematography was really well done, great sweeping shots of the terrain and really up-close claustrophobic shots on the train. It did a good job of keeping the audience in the scene.
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