Review of Treed Murray (2001) by Shane C — 18 Jul 2007

I had no expectations going into this as I had never heard of it and thank goodness I didn't. It's 45 minutes too long and peppered with cliches and pure drivel. Its attempts at being morally eye-opening and how the divisions of class and social status are less important than life itself are true, but the immature execution, two dimensional characters whom I cared nothing about, and expectation to suspend disbelief beyond anything realistic or even likely was too much for me.

I appreciate the attempt at a single set drama about relationships and people's knee-jerk judgments upon others, but this needed a page-one rewrite and would have worked far better as a 1 act stage play than a film.

The lack of nearly all character growth, arc, or story resolution left me feeling cheated... the film ENDED at the beginning of the third act!!! Its potential, promise does not deliver and the film is amateur.

And if a guy trapped in a tree sounds boring, remember Cast Away... but also remember this is nowhere even close to being Tom Hanks, Robert Zemeckis, and William Broyles. That would be comparing Keanu Reeves to Cary Grant.