Review of Café Society (2016) by Ella G — 21 Jun 2017

Stellar cast, but a movie that makes you feel nothing.

Any character development is portrayed only in narration and frankly is the only thing that moves the story forward. A scene with Bobby and a prostitute is included early on that is not only out of place and uncomfortable but just not needed; the scene doesn't tell you anything about Bobby's character that you don't know already or find out.

While the cinematography is excellent the dialogue is frantic and makes you feel like you're sitting in on their conversation, which could be effective if it didn't wholeheartedly conflict with the look and feel of the film.

The actors are incredible but the story and script don't allow you to emotionally invest in any of them. You follow a series of bad decisions and situations where Bobby shoots himself in the foot time and time again but you don't really care about the outcome. Even when the brother died I felt nothing, and apparently neither did the rest of the characters.

Comments and jokes feel out of character half the time even with larger than life characters filling the screen.

To top it off the ending is so very poor. Maybe it was meant to feel nostalgic and sombre but with no emotional attachment to almost any character, the only person I felt sorry for was Bobby's wife, even if the only emotion she could show was vapid happiness.

At the end of it all I was left thinking "Is that it?".

Definitely 2 hours of my life I will never get back..