Last week we saw two movies in two days: Into the Storm and Boyhood. The first, an updating of the "classic" Twister was chock full of special effects and lasted but 89 minutes. Boyhood, filmed over the course of twelve years, had not a single special effect but ran 165 minutes.
One assumes the target audiences for Into the Storm are adolescents and 20-something guys. Stock characters living the oft-repeated American cinematic version of a coming-of-age plot ending in transformation and pretty much happiness ever after. The tornadic special effects were exceptionally good and there was even an homage to the "cows blowing in the wind" scene from Twister. Not as much fun as one might have expected but worth a discounted admission if you can score it.
Boyhood, by contrast was an authentic story of aging as we get to to see young Mason, his sister Samantha, and their parents (played by Ethan Hawke and Patricia Arquette) actually age. Written with a fine ear for realistic dialog and the heartfelt disappointments of life through the eyes of a boy. No happy ending but not an altogether sad one either. In other words, we saw something far closer to real life with all its unexpected turns and as-yet unknown results. "Life is hard but we muddle on" might describe the theme of Boyhood, which was not too long even at over two and one-half hours.
One assumes the target audiences for Into the Storm are adolescents and 20-something guys. Stock characters living the oft-repeated American cinematic version of a coming-of-age plot ending in transformation and pretty much happiness ever after. The tornadic special effects were exceptionally good and there was even an homage to the "cows blowing in the wind" scene from Twister. Not as much fun as one might have expected but worth a discounted admission if you can score it.
Boyhood, by contrast was an authentic story of aging as we get to to see young Mason, his sister Samantha, and their parents (played by Ethan Hawke and Patricia Arquette) actually age. Written with a fine ear for realistic dialog and the heartfelt disappointments of life through the eyes of a boy. No happy ending but not an altogether sad one either. In other words, we saw something far closer to real life with all its unexpected turns and as-yet unknown results. "Life is hard but we muddle on" might describe the theme of Boyhood, which was not too long even at over two and one-half hours.
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