Lots of spoilers.
A weak movie. The main theme is that the villagers love their "mountain." The movie pounds that drum over and over again, ad nauseam. And yet, the viewer is left asking, "Who cares?" When a film has to work so hard to sell its central idea, you can be sure it's because there's little substance to it.
Despite the soaring, almost-but-not-quite inspiring soundtrack, the viewer is still left asking, "Who cares?" There is a conflict between Morgan and the Reverend. It goes undeveloped. If the narrator didn't tell us they weren't speaking to one another, we'd never know.
Hugh Grant falls in love after having a single beer with a woman he's just met. Grant plays the same role he's played in every movie he's ever been in: the befuddled, bemused ironic observer who can't seem to understand why the people around him are befuddled and bemused.
All we see of the villagers are a dozen men in a bar. Until the end of the movie, when hundreds of villagers suddenly appear on screen. Where'd they come from? Prior to those ending scenes, the village was mostly a ghost town aside from the few main characters.
None of the characters are particularly likable.
And there's a glaring point where the plot falls apart--after being told how important the mountain is, and how it has protected the Welsh from invaders for centuries, we learn that it wasn't the mountain that protected them after all. It was the torrential Welsh rains. So which was it that saved Wales? The mountain or the rain? It has it's entertaining parts. Here and there.
A movie about life in a Welsh town would've been much, much more interesting and enjoyable.
A weak movie. The main theme is that the villagers love their "mountain." The movie pounds that drum over and over again, ad nauseam. And yet, the viewer is left asking, "Who cares?" When a film has to work so hard to sell its central idea, you can be sure it's because there's little substance to it.
Despite the soaring, almost-but-not-quite inspiring soundtrack, the viewer is still left asking, "Who cares?" There is a conflict between Morgan and the Reverend. It goes undeveloped. If the narrator didn't tell us they weren't speaking to one another, we'd never know.
Hugh Grant falls in love after having a single beer with a woman he's just met. Grant plays the same role he's played in every movie he's ever been in: the befuddled, bemused ironic observer who can't seem to understand why the people around him are befuddled and bemused.
All we see of the villagers are a dozen men in a bar. Until the end of the movie, when hundreds of villagers suddenly appear on screen. Where'd they come from? Prior to those ending scenes, the village was mostly a ghost town aside from the few main characters.
None of the characters are particularly likable.
And there's a glaring point where the plot falls apart--after being told how important the mountain is, and how it has protected the Welsh from invaders for centuries, we learn that it wasn't the mountain that protected them after all. It was the torrential Welsh rains. So which was it that saved Wales? The mountain or the rain? It has it's entertaining parts. Here and there.
A movie about life in a Welsh town would've been much, much more interesting and enjoyable.