Review of The Burning Plain (2008) by Daniel K — 11 Jul 2010

2: I guess this is about what I was expecting, which wasn't a whole lot so I wasn't too disappointed. I do wish Inarritu and Arriaga were still working together and still producing work on par with their earlier masterpiece, Amores Perros.

For one thing, I think they should get back to making films outside of Hollywood. Not that pictures like Babel and 21 Grams aren't interesting, but they are merely a pale shadow of their earlier work in Mexico.

Arriaga's story here is interesting, but the fractured structure seems a bit forced and doesn't always seem necessary or even advisable. It only works when there is a strong force driving it down this path.

Films like this can rest on the edge of a knife in that all the elements of the picture really need to be firing on all cylinders in order for it to have the desired effect. This one was a little too wobbly to really excel.

The characters motivations were a bit hard to figure out at times as well, which is exactly what one doesn't want in a picture like this. It wasn't awful, but it was a failure. A 2 may be too high.