Review of Cassandra's Dream (2007) by Mahmoud K — 21 Dec 2010

Woody Allen's contemporary-set London thriller is a slow burner. Cassandra's Dream tells the story of two brothers (Ewan McGregor and Colin Farrell are perfectly cast here and both do superb jobs throughout the whole film) who are deeply indebt in different ways.

Enter their rich uncle (played by an always fantastic Tom Wilkinson) who is willing to help them out with their monetary issues but first they need to do him a favor. Without trying to give too much away for those who haven't seen the film there is a certain disgruntled worker that Wilkinson needs "taking care of".

Now McGregor and Farrell are tasked with the ever so gracious task of doing away with said worker. What follows is the strain on the relationship between the two brothers and their respective girlfriends: Farrell's Sally Hawkins best known for her incredible work in Happy Go Lucky who's not only a very beautiful woman but a highly talented actress, she's simply extraordinary.

And as for McGregor's other half of the equation there's newcomer Haley Atwell who other than a few smaller projects basically entered Dream right out of acting school. For one so "new" to the process, it honestly doesn't show at all because Atwell (like Hawkins) is not only an incredibly gorgeous woman but an actress who has a great abundance of talent that's beyond her years.

She is completely flawless as McGregor's better half. The acting portion of the film is great as is the writing. The story is well thought out, genuinely intriguing and up to the initial incident is really well executed.

Sadly though it begings to fall short of greatness after this point. For all the good ideas that the film does possess, as was previously mentioned it's a "slow burner". Once the initial setup is dealt with it begins to drag, certain scenes seem to have not as much purpose as those that proceeded it, and they do tend to drag and feel a tad lengthy at times.

And while it may be a stylistic choice, I couldn't get passed the overuse of Allen's long shots. Characters would talk and talk for minutes at a time without any closeups or reaction shots. Personally more editing I think would have helped.

One other negative point would be that as good as the writing and the dialogue was, some of it was frustratingly repetitive. A character would say something and then say basically the exact same thing twenty minutes later, and then five minutes later after that.

It's okay we get it! You're pissed and scared, we get it, trust us, WE GET IT. We don't need to keep being reminded of that time and time again. Now to put it simply the first act is great, the second act is so-so and the third act with its gut-wrenching and very intense conclusion makes this a "decent-but-could-have-and-should-have-been-better-morality-thriller".