teokitten — 14 years ago(February 01, 2012 11:38 PM)

Very disappointing considering the fact that there are different actors, their character is changed a lot (e.g. Cardinal Vittorio is suddenly a bad person, Meggy's mom is too kind, Meggy's daughter too hateful, Luke too mean, Meggy's boy too fat etc etc) - also, what's with all the crying?? Meggy, a strong woman, cries all the time, and her mother, who in the original series never shed a tear, now is seen crying with despair -, Ralph is much too old and static, one can notice a total loss of feeling, of involvement; the Australian accent seems fake and forced; the institution of the Church appears in a bad light, while in the mini-series it was enveloped in holiness and sanctity, I mean I am an atheist and when I saw the mini-series that sense of divine and purity really touched me, while in this movie the main character has rather turned away from God and the Church itself is corrupt and vile. Also the characters themselves aren't very convincing. The sound is weird and disturbing all along the movie, the atmosphere is too bleak, too much darkness in almost all scenes taking place indoors. And last but not least, if you consider the original mini series you must notice that the flow of events isn't respected and that's really troublesome (for instance in the original Ralph meets Meggy's children for the first time when they are all grown up.).
All in all, I wish I hadn't seen this one. After all the years which passed since the original was released I expected a much better production.