I just watched this movie for the first time last night.
I know it came up, but the sound mix early was horrid. Trying to keep the action scenes quiet enough so that we didn’t wake the kids, hi opera house, you bastards, while making the dialogue audible was irritating as hell. Maybe if I wasn’t having to worry about that and could crank things up it would have been fine, but my god was that making things more difficult.
I also didn’t quite get the stakes. Why was the main character so invested in this girl? I feel like I missed something for why he cares.
The concept is interesting, and I am sure it has some kind of puzzle box construction. And in fact the last hour I was really digging. The Oslo freeport round 2? That was exactly what I was wanting.
Ultimately I have no idea if I like it or not. I’d need to watch it again. It does lean a bit too much into cleverness for its own sake. Unlike Inception, which goes for a similar intricate plotting but one that is able to be legible the first time but has details and nuance that only comes on repeat views, this one just makes no sense at first.
And again, part of that may have been the audio mix pushing the dialogue down so far that I couldn’t hear it without risking waking 3 sleeping kids. Yes Christopher I know you design it for the theater experience, but some of us have families so maybe don’t ruin it for those who are watching for the fist time another method, especially when the film came out during a pandemic you auteur asshole.