Polanski (Unauthorized)

I went to the premier of Polanski (Unauthorized) this evening with high hopes. I first saw Helter Skelter at the ridiculously young age of 12 and although I had many nightmares after seeing it, this turned my summer into a strange mission to learn about the Manson Family it was then that I learned about Roman Polanski. Anyways this was a movie I was really looking forward to seeing and man am I disappointed. Its like 3 movies rolled into one but with bad editing choices. There is some interesting camera work, music and lighting at times but what really bothered me was the cuts in between the 3 time periods (1934-44, 1966-69, 75-78). If one scene ended, on what was intended to be a poignant note, the next scene would yank you right out of it so you couldn't digest it. I mean if you are going to jump around like that at least let there be some semblance of cohesiveness between the time periods. Just so that its not so jarring to the senses. It was unfortunate because many parts are beautiful or interesting enough to stand on their own as works of art. They should've just let it ride out chronicologically and given us little flashbacks toward the ugly rape trial stuff at the end to strengthen the audiences understanding of Polanski's pathology. The acting was really terrible too. And this wasn't poor acting that could be blamed on bad writing (although that left much to be desired as well). Most of the actors seemed to be anticipating what line was coming next rather than experiencing it for the first time. It was as though they were just waiting for the other actor to stop speaking so that they could deliver their line. I knew we were in trouble in the beginning of the movie where Polanski meets Sharon Tate for the first time. The dialogue between Polanski and the man who becomes the financier of his next film was artificial, it just played out too perfectly and ended up seeming corny. The actress playing Sharon Tate also seemed to just be spitting out her lines (in an annoying voice) but she got better towards the latter half of the film. The Anton LaVey character was just silly to me, in fact the part where Polanski is hiring him to be his "Technical Advisor" almost made me laugh out loud because he finishes Polanski's line saying "Technical advisor" in such an contrived way. The gentleman who plays Polanski's producer was the best actor out of the bunch although I cannot say that I felt a real connection between any of them. Before I forget, I also thought that they could have just used subtitles instead of mixing in the pertinent English dialogue into French and Hebrew. This was a fiasco, the actress playing a loose woman from Spain even says 'El Spain" hahahaha, that just sounds ridiculous. In fact all the bimbos in the film just seemed like typical Hollywood girls you'd see out tonight. Could it be that I saw one of the circa 1977 dresses in a Forever 21 window??? It is late and I am not remembering everything, perhaps tomorrow I will remember more of the good parts. The second half is better and the director who also plays Polanski has a some great moments. All in all I can sense that there was a big vision for this film. Maybe someone with a lot of loot will sense that too and help this guy have another go at it.

Ciao