Review of Equals (2015) by Tatsuhito K — 16 Aug 2016

I'm a big fan of Drake Doremus and I strongly think he's a very talented director; I loved "Like Crazy" and I also liked "Breathe In" quite a bit despite its mixed reception.

But I have to be honest... "Equals" let me down big time. The idea of emotion-free society has been around for quite some time, and a number of interesting films and novels about this theme have been created before, so I was curious to see what kind of film Doremus could cook up with a premise such as this.

The result was a dull, deeply flawed, emotionally hollow romantic drama that feels more style over substance. I love both Stewart and Hoult, but there was no chemistry between them. I didn't care about their characters at all, in fact, I didn't care about anything that's going on in the film.

I kept hoping that something interesting might happen, some dramatic moments that challenge me intellectually and emotionally, but it never did. I'm also a huge fan of John Guleserian's cinematography, but this time it seemed plain pretentious and didn't enhance the theme of the story.

I still have faith in Doremus and I'm positive that he will come back with another terrific indie film. "Equals" is full of potential and interesting ideas, but it doesn't really do much with it.