Tension: Will Roy get caught/killed?
Theme: There’s always gotta be another step that motivates you to keep going for your future.
Writing: For such a strong premise this had a very slow start. But then it picked up. I just couldn’t understand what people were talking about and referencing enough but I caught on. Once they got to the mountains is when it improved. The bad luck dog was a good touch especially with it being so innocent and pure, it wasn’t so much bad luck as it was the good inside bad people trying to intervene. Velma seemed like she was 15 which made me grossed out that Bogart was courting her but I guess she was supposed to be 20? The femme fatale was definitely a lot older in comparison. But the relationship dynamics between the three were interesting, trying to discern what was him settling vs real love. And the fact that he bought the surgery for the girl only to get friendzoned…yeah you should’ve seen that one coming buddy. But he didn’t take the money they offered which would have actually saved him in the end, so once again good deeds putting bad people in trouble. The heist itself was confusing until they actually started, like what they were waiting for exactly and why those two guys were just causing trouble but I guess they were stir crazy.
Acting: I liked most of the acting, mixed feelings about Velma but she still convinced me. Bogart does a great job with nuance in his characters and changing his emotions when you least expect it making you want to study him.
Cinematography: the very end scene has some great camera work but the chase scenes…gosh I’m sorry but it was bad. The way it was so obvious an inexperienced camera op was lowering a tripod too tight that just felt like screen was shifting every second in an extremely noticeable way. And speeding up the footage to make it go faster for turns on mountain that would obviously send cars flying. The beginning with the newspaper transitions was fun. After that things were pretty slow I should have noticed more.
Production Design: Good settings, very much gave vibes based on where they were at like the desert vs the mountains vs Ohio. With so many scenes surprisingly in nature for a heist movie I bet this worked very well for a budget.
Sound: classic soundtracks with reactions matched. Overly loud sound effects including the two slaps at the beginning which were a bit cliche actually.
Editing: can’t remember at the moment.
Chosen still
