I saw this in a film festival recently, and for a directorial debut thought it was a good thriller with assertive direction and a tense plot.
However - you cannot help but be annoyed and marvelled at all times by the sheer stupidity shown by the two protagonists; it is realistic at times and at other times not. A certain and highly implausible scene on a bus early in the film nearly ruined that sense of realism for me, but otherwise the movie kept everything pretty real in the sense that the two brothers are merely amateurs and hadn't planned things properly. Performances are good, but due to the nature of the story it is difficult to have any empathy with the characters, and you cant but help to chuckle and be relieved over their shortcomings.
There is some sense of social critique under it all, but (un)fortunately this is never delved too much into in order to fully justify their actions; the director has been less interested in motivations and character background, more interested in minute details of the crime and the act of kidnapping someone, leaving us pondering over the why's until the very end.
However - you cannot help but be annoyed and marvelled at all times by the sheer stupidity shown by the two protagonists; it is realistic at times and at other times not. A certain and highly implausible scene on a bus early in the film nearly ruined that sense of realism for me, but otherwise the movie kept everything pretty real in the sense that the two brothers are merely amateurs and hadn't planned things properly. Performances are good, but due to the nature of the story it is difficult to have any empathy with the characters, and you cant but help to chuckle and be relieved over their shortcomings.
There is some sense of social critique under it all, but (un)fortunately this is never delved too much into in order to fully justify their actions; the director has been less interested in motivations and character background, more interested in minute details of the crime and the act of kidnapping someone, leaving us pondering over the why's until the very end.