Uncle Boonmee Is Not for Me

Halfway through Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives, my attention wained and never returned. I knew it was going to be slow and for the first hour, I was a good, attentive viewer. The red-eyed creature in the woods, the reveal of Boonmee's dead wife at the dinner table, and the entrance of his long-lost son... all solid stuff. But they are brief moments in an often striking but always dull film.

The first moments I felt alienated from Uncle Boonmee was during the first scene with dialogue. I wasn't sure if it was the rhythm of the language or just stilted acting, but everything was still and lifeless. Director Apichatpong Weerasethakul he did this on purpose and I have no reason to doubt him, but there are reasons that I'm not the biggest fan of Ozu's work (whose actors remind me most of the acting style here). It's not interesting to watch people who seem uncomfortable delivering lines speak to each other and knowing I have two hours of it is going to take me out of the experience quickly. The surreal elements mentioned above helped keep me in the film, but that only works so long without involving characters.

Another aspect that confounded me was how disparate the look of Uncle Boonmee is from scene to scene. Sometimes, the shots look like a rank amateur is behind the camera with everything looking flat and dull while other images are composed and stunning (Weerasethakul states that this variation in style is also intentional). Maybe I'd be more interested in exploring the reasons behind the shifts in style, but without anything holding my attention, it's wasted effort (though he regained with the talking catfish and ensuing sex scene between said catfish and a woman).

I freely admit that I don't "get" Uncle Boonmee. I think there's something lost culturally on me and certainly thematically since it's a part of an overarching "Primitive" project by Weerasethakul. Frequently, Uncle Boonmee is beautiful and the way I would appreciate it most is to cut it into still photos and short segments and have those displayed in a gallery. As a narrative, I got very little out of it, but as a series of brief experiences, I think it could be very impressive. 

Uncle Boonmee also features the most insect noise I've heard this side of The Walking Dead.