*** Official THE FORGOTTEN Review Thread (1 Viewer)

[Alex Spindler]

Caught this and was quite pleasantly surprised. I had feared that the overly revealing trailer had ruined it for me, but being devoted to Julianne Moore and everything she works on, I was compelled to go.

She is, as I had hoped, excellent in the film as the lead. The role calls for a lot of emotion and she carries it out very well. Dominic West from "The Wire" was also pretty good.

The best part was being surprised by where the film was headed. Based on the trailer, I had made some assumptions that it was aping Vanilla Sky, but was quite happy to be given curveballs overall. The film is also deft in handling the more fantastical elements and I was well engaged throughout.

From a technical standpoint, there was a bizarre switch from steadicam to handheld and back again with no rhyme or reason. It was a bit distracting, but otherwise it was capably shot. Overall, I wouldn't call the score or directing particularly memorable.


All in all, a film I would easily recommend to others, especially if you're a fan of Julianne. :star: :star: :star: (out of four)

 

[Patrick Sun]

I'm not sure what the film thought it wanted to be, so I think the first half is better than the second half. The film leaves too many questions unanswered for my curiosity, so I am not as high on it as I could have been given the setup.

Julianne Moore is good, but, goodness, she does a lot of physical running in this movie, and that made it feel like just filler to pad out the film, while shortchanging the viewer on the last act of the film.

I give it 2.5 stars, or a grade of C+.

 

[Dave Hackman]

I forget why I wanted to see this movie. Oh that’s right it was the hope that this would be a nice mysterious Vanilla Sky/Dark City type film. Well it is similar, but simplified for the remedial set back movie zombie. This film has no balls and is soulless. What a pathetic attempt to milk such a weak plot for over an hour. I wanted to strangle Julianne Moore with her damn whining throughout the flick, she just went on and on and on and I thought she would never shut up. The ending is just awful and is something you would expect from an episode of the Brady Bunch. I must say that this movie makes the Village look like an academy award winner.

Studios stop showing key moments of your films during trailers because it weakens your product by desensitizing the viewer from the freshness of the initial experience.

I did enjoy the shock moments and actually jumped during the first one, but this isn’t enough to warrant a higher rating or a repeat viewing.

D -

 

[Holadem]

Julianne Moore and some interesting ideas made this one of me. Tense, straight to the point, I liked it. :star::star::star:.

--
H

 

[Kevin Grey]

I liked the perfomances, good integration of digital effects, and several excellent jump scares.

The ending, on the other hand, is enough for me not to recommend it. It makes absolutely no sense whatsoever and was clearly tacked on to make a happy ending.

 

[Elizabeth S]

Such an interesting premise, but plays out like a BAD "X-Files" episode. Linus Roache is also too talented to be taking roles like "Friendly Man".

The theme of the unbreakable parent/child bond seems like a surefire manipulative emotional trigger, but left me cold.

:star: :star:

 

[Robert Crawford]

This thread is now the Official Review Thread for "The Forgotten". Please post all HTF member reviews in this thread.

Any other comments, links to other reviews, or discussion items will be deleted from this thread without warning!

If you need to discuss those type of issues then I have designated an Official Discussion Thread.



Crawdaddy

 

[Ted Lee]

i'll echo other's thoughts.

1. a couple of really good jump moments. one of them almost gave me a heart-attack. but, the reviews and (surprisingly enough) ebert & roeper's review give them away.

2. great "vibe" to the movie. i got a nice spooky kinda feelin' from it.

3. stupid, stupid ending. the fact that the "bad guy" had to explain what was going on just nailed it home.

i'd give it a C or recommend rental only.

 

[Ricardo C]

Sooooo lookie who's late for the party :b

I just caught this at my friendly neighborhood multiplex. I liked it, but it tried too hard to be Dark City, and way too much was left unexplained. Now, leaving certain things up to the viewer is well and good, but not if you give them nothing to go on.

What happened to Telly's husband? Was he in on it or was he brainwashed into thinking he never had a wife? What became of him? The writer seems to have been so in love with the idea of getting Telly and Ash together that Jim is just, well, forgotten after he serves his purpose.

Why was it so easy for "the Friendly Man" to erase someone's memories? If his species has this power, couldn't he have conducted his experiment without putting the subjects through a year of therapy? Or is that cheating?

Are we to assume the victims had all their memories restored? Or that the crash/abduction was wipe from everyone's memory?

Just how many people are in on the coverup? The newspaper archives in the library had been tampered with, but what about all the people that read the news item when it was first published? It seems that these aliens would need to keep tabs on tens of millions of people just to keep the experiment going.

Perhaps building up until the big reveal, only to find out that Telly WAS delusional would have given viewers the shock the filmmakers were after.