THE WALL (THE MOVIE)

This project (part 3 of the "Wall media package") is very dark, often depressing, and has a storyline. That's because the album is it's soundtrack. Fine. So lets review the attributes that are unique to this version of 'The Wall'.

All the filming, screenplay, acting, dream sequences, pretty much everything, is done in a very ART-like way. This is no mainstream rom-com. It's a rock opera/concept album with accompanying imagery. And the imagery is always in keeping with the cynical dark style of the album and songs, but of course is bound to get boring after a while. The animated sequences help break this up, and I can appreciate the effort put into those in particular. The storyboard that accompanies 'The Trial' is very fitting, almost perfect for it's cause. And much of the film's similarly strange thematics give you an intentional sense of paranoia and unease. Is it necccesary though?

Probably not, because it doesn't deliver much that the album itself hasn't already got. So with that in mind, moments of this film seem a little insignificant. For example, we don't need a visual explanation of 'Comfortably Numb' because the nature of that song is already obvious. The on screen accompanyment does add some weight, but not as much as you would expect a feature-length movie to. And although Bob Geldof conveys a largely non-speaking part very well, his role as Pink seems a little over-emphasised. It's almost like Waters had this film made to try and explain in a more obvious way the storyline of his rock opera, rather than to accentuate the existing concepts that were explored in the studio and on stage.

Reading over this, I appear to have given a rather negative review, but one thing I can't take away from this film is the feeling it gives you during and shortly after it. Like the album, it certainly is a remarkably deep experience, it just doesn't last for very long. It's no masterpiece but it has vision and depth, and isn't that what film-making is all about?

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