Diamond Cartel (2017)

Best movie of this year hands down!

Just intense enough to provide a much-needed diversion, just lightweight enough to make you forget about it soon after it’s over. It’s not exactly “good,” per se, but it does what it sets out to do in terms of putting us on edge, which makes it … successful?

A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.

There's a more than satisfactory amount of boom-boom in the movie's trim running time.

Before watching this movie, I had never seen a movie made by Kazakhstani filmmakers before. After watching it, I have no desire to see another effort, at least any time in the near future. This movie goes wrong in just about every area you can think of. The only positive things I can about it is that it's decently shot, has (mostly) decent production values for what clearly wasn't a mega budget, and it has a one in a lifetime cast (though most of these well known actors are wasted in very small roles.) However, the movie is for the most part such a mess, it's hard to get any enjoyment out of those positive features. The story is extremely confusing, as if something went terribly wrong when it was translated into English. None of the characters are particularly sympathetic or interesting, with the only interest being how badly a lot of them are dubbed into English. Also, the movie doesn't know what it wants to be. Sometimes it's an action flick, other times it's a suspense thriller, and other times it plays like a very black comedy. With no constant tone, it's hard to keep your mind focused on what's happening, so much so that you'll start to forget the few coherent story details minutes after they unfold.... and you'll forget the entire movie minutes after the end credits start to unfold. I usually love B movies, but this particular one is really bad, even for my low standards.

This is just . . . strange, surrealistically bad. It's intended to be (I think) some sort Kazakhstan interpretation of cliché action movie vignettes, woven together into a bizarre concoction of what is supposed to be a story, of sorts. As a sort visual art piece, it does have its moments. Clearly a lot of work and technical effort went into this production, not to mention a budget to make this possible. Perhaps the most interesting aspect of this film is who they managed to get to star in this strange production.The voice dubbing is beyond comical, but then again, that description summarizes this entire production. Clearly, this is not for everyone, or even that many, but for those looking for a weirdly out of sync, attempted cultural experiment in hybrid Kazakhstan dark comedy filmcraft, this might be your cup of tea . . . maybe.Rating? OK, 3 stars for effort.

They had a lot of material to work with. It looks like an OK movie ended up on the cutting room floor. The production value was there, the acting and dialogue wasn't great but who cares? It needed at least a few scenes in civilization so the low budget wilderness wouldn't be so obvious. Too many twenty foot high doors being opened by tiny people.

I've heard over the years that Jerry Lewis is revered in France. Apparently, in Kazakhstan, they revere 80's American crap action movies. Apparently, they study them closely. Somebody got enough money to get some big and small western names, some pretty starlets, a whole bunch of tough looking people to play actors acting in a crap action movie, an arsenal of weapons, blanks and squibs and then set out to deliberately (it can't be an accident) re-create the best of the worst of the 80's drive-in fodder. They even got them a young French Keanu clone. The only reason it's in English is because they dubbed (with the exception of Assante and Madsen) essentially the entire movie and instructed the voice actors to disregard what was on the screen and concentrate on enunciation. They even dub O'Toole for the five minutes he's in it.Early on, I thought Armand Assante ("Paradise Alley") was going to be big. Here he shows why that never happened. We already know Michael Madsen will say yes to a paycheck. Not that there's anything wrong with that. But it gets worse: all three of these big names signed on for a two picture deal. This is the second. This one is probably better.On the other hand, if you like 80's crap, this is real good.That this would end up being Peter O'Toole's last film, that his career would end with three strikes, is an unfortunate illustration of the mundane reality of the glamorous film business.