Man Down (2016)

A Masterpiece!

Good films always raise compelling questions, whether the format is fiction or documentary fact.

It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

One of the most extraordinary films you will see this year. Take that as you want.

Man Down is the worst movie I've ever seen, however upon viewing The Mummy last evening, I can now say that Man Down is the 2nd worst movie I've ever seen. The abject offensiveness of this stinking beast is enough to make any plumber wretch with interminable abandon. The premise, Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, is unforgivably bleached and appropriated in order to advertise a post apocalyptic theme in hopes of juxtaposing the former in favor of the latter. Elevating vagueness and confusion to previously unknown definitive heights, we feel as though parallel scenes of trauma and reality were poured into a lottery like device and then poured and pasted together without any semblance of coherence or continuity. Unbearably, we feel as though we are aging when we watch this film, as Kate and Shia and Gary insanely perform with near perfection within a structure possessed by incompetence and grounded down by ineptitude. Perhaps this is my basic gripe, that so much talent was so detestably wasted by the stupidity of the producers, writers and directors. Or perhaps I am insulted by the opportunity the film had to creatively symbolize the actual and real devastation of PTSD. Most pathetic of all, the manifold and multiform editing of Man Down, trying far too hard to encapsulate and replicate the phenomenology of the trauma of PTSD, feels completely cheap and derivative, trying to illuminate a condition the creators of the film clearly know absolutely nothing about, inauthentically trying to make us believe what is real and what is not is a clever plot device rather an an absolute failure in all things imaginable. This film made me feel actual guilt in spending money to view this piece of trash.

Man Down is very much a mixed bag of a film where the filmmakers seem to throw pretty much everything into the mix apart from the kitchen sink. It's almost as if they use the old adage of 'throw enough mud at the wall and eventually some of it will stick.' In fairness, some of it did stick, but sadly there's also an awful lot that didn't...The narrative is clearly a big problem with this film; it darts about all over the place, but never in a way that makes much logical sense. Another issue is that I found that it flitted from one scene to another without offering me much to reflect upon; it breezes through the story so quickly that it's barely possible to care about anyone or anything that happens. The choppy storyline also makes it hard to follow and whilst it does come together and sort of makes sense at the end that doesn't make for a particularly good viewing experience overall. Another issue I had with this film is that it seemed to spend too much time focusing on what I'd call less interesting areas; Drummer's de-brief seemed to take up about a third of the film's running time - wouldn't 5-10 minutes at the end have been sufficient? The earlier scenes involving Drummer's home life were also uninteresting (although part of the problem I had is that LaBeouf and Mara had literally zero chemistry).Where the film starts to improve is once we get into the final third of the film where we start to witness Drummer's PTSD and the effect that it has on him and everyone around him. Whilst the film does little new in this area, it was still good to watch and this is all helped by a wonderful performance by LaBeouf - he hasn't always been brilliant in the past, but here he does excel and is very believable (both before his PTSD and during his PTSD). In retrospect, it seems clear that some of Drummer's scenes are pre-war scenes (before his PTSD) and some scenes are during his PTSD - I got the impression that the scenes where Drummer finds a survivor whilst looking for his son and wife weren't real and this was a fictitious scenario that was played out in his head as a result of his PTSD - at least that's how I saw things!!.I've given this film half marks and to be fair most of those marks arrived in the second half of the film (mainly for the PTSD aspects and for LaBoeuf's performance). Unfortunately, I found that the film didn't focus enough of its energy in the right areas a lot of the time resulting in a messy film that never really held my interest until the last half an hour. If you can cope with the choppy narrative, slow-pace and are interested in the subject matter then this may work for you, but I've got a feeling that a lot of folks (like me) are ultimately going to find Man Down a rather disappointing waste of potential.

Shia pulls off an intense performance as a marine who returns home after a traumatic experience in Afghanistan, only to find his home life shattered.The exploration of his traumatization is well scripted and well acted. The film includes performances from Gary Oldman, Kate Mara, and Jai Courtney. It is well acted, well scripted and hard hitting on an emotional level. The directing and final edit leave something to be desired, however. One can see how a re-edit could have led this film to a decent showing. As it stands, it was never going to be a crowd pleaser. It is engaging and has a twist that will have you thinking about the plight of the marine.To be watched critically more than mind soothing entertainment.

Just watched Man Down (the one that sold a single ticket in the U.K. in theaters opening weekend)...you can hate Shia LeBeouf and his political stances all you want but that was a BRILLIANT performance. That movie was not at all what I expected. Completely heartbreaking...but I think it needed to be made.