The Art of Woo (2001)

ridiculous rating

Bad Acting and worse Bad Screenplay

The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

Blistering performances.

When I like an actor or actress in a certain project, I tend to make my way through their filmography list to see some of their other performances.I was interested in seeing Adam Beach in a romantic role as everything else I had seen so far has had a mostly male bonding focus to it.I wasn't disappointed with what I saw. As Ben Crowchild, he portrayed a really charismatic and reticent kind of guy. "Tall, dark, and brooding" if you will. However, his co-star had an inconsistent performance in regards to her character's quirky-ness, and it made his performance look less consistent than it actually was. (Watching the movie the second time around brought that to light. All the scenes without her were fluid.) I also thought the direction could have been stronger. As in, I wish one scene, a scene where they argue, had been re-shot.(*Spoilerish*) Another disappointment was the 'artsy' take to the romance scene. I spend those moments trying to figure out what I was actually seeing. (Is that an arm or a leg? And whose?) My last criticism is of the inane beginning. I would have rathered watched her walking down the street and taken the time to read the credits than the singing dancing thing.Ok, enough synopsis. The bottom line is that there are some really endearing moments in this film. Definately worth plowing through if you are a fan of Adam Beach's.

Some random comments about a film that doesn't deserve much thought: *Adam Beach is an awful actor; If Graham Greene is the native Canadian Tommy Lee Jones, Beach is the native Canadian Paul Walker.*Sook-Yin Lee was an annoying VJ on an annoying channel and now she's an annoying actress playing an annoying character.*"Woo" typifies in a number of ways the stereotypically bad Canadian movie; flat cinematography, stock, naive characters, inane dialogue.I'd rather insert a toolbox into my rectum than endure sitting through this again.

This review is a tad of a spoiler, but very little.I had never heard of this movie before I stumbled upon the (two) copies of it at my video store... probably because it's Canadian(!)Anyway, I enjoyed it, sweet and funny... It's only two days later that I understood it's most important characteristic, when I finally saw "Breakfast at Tiffany's" for the first time (it was on CBC). This movie is a pastiche of the Audrey Hepburn classic! It's very obvious, especially at the beginning, practically each scene mirrors the original film. Let's revisit our oldies shall we!

Absolutely tedious and unmoving in every respect. Acting is bad and unbelievable. Dialogue is bad and unbelievable. Plot is bad and unbelievable. For God's sake, even the sex scene is boring. The people are certainly pretty enough to look at, but if that's all I want, I can find that anywhere.