Review of Downsizing (2017) by Tony H — 17 Mar 2018

I am not familiar with the films of Alexander Payne, in fact, this was my first one from him. Due to the rather lukewarm reaction I'm assuming this was not the best first impression.

I entered this film expecting a comedy, that's what the advertisements depicted it as. A film about a man and a wife who decide to escape life's problems by shrinking down to minuscule heights, hilarity ensues. However, the film itself was a different matter all together, the wife character was gone after only 10 minutes of screentime giving us instead Matt Damon as our singular protagonist. All the 'comedy' that was to be expected was instead replaced with drama. I'm not against drama, but it was simply not what I was expecting.

That becomes the movie's mantra, "Not what you were expecting".

It is the reason this movie has been getting lambasted by critics and audience's alike, the advertising just didn't fit. It's not the movie's fault exactly, instead the blame falls on the schmucks who's job it was to advertise it.

The film has some interesting ideas, a world where miniaturization is prominent is the key one, but it feels wasted by a protagonist with the personality of a wet cardboard box. Most of the characters feel one note, with little to no character development. Any attempts instead resulted in failure.

Which is truly a shame, because not one actor put in a poor performance. They were just hindered by a script which was begging for a rewrite. Something that it easily should have gotten, as it entered preproduction way back in 2009.

The effects weren't bad either, in fact they were pretty damn good. The film put good use to it's $68 million budget. Speaking of, I gotta address the utter waste that went to. Putting that much money into a project like this was just asking for it to bomb, which it ultimately did.

The cinematography was also pretty good, it truly did convey the smallness of the world, but most of that can be attributed to the budget.

Another one of the film's greatest faults was the length, stretching well past the 2 hour mark, it felt like a journey to finish, and not an enjoyable one. There is only so much mileage you can squeeze out of a project such as this, and it ran out of juice halfway through.

The story itself was one of the biggest offenders, utilizing a great concept so little, monotony creeps in rather quickly. The film tries to counteract this by tossing more and more plot at you, most of which goes nowhere and amounts to nothing. It asks questions that it simply forgets to answer, like when one character gets in an argument of wether or not 'little' people deserve the right to vote. It is forgotten literally seconds later, and never brought up again.

Pointless is the main buzzword here.

Not to mention the ending that follows in the pattern of wasted opportunity.

To sum it up, it's a waste of potential... but a nicely filmed and acted waste of potential. This is a film I should have liked, but I will probably forget watching as soon as this review is posted.