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The Broken

Posted: Mon Aug 25, 2008 1:42 am
by DavieT
Interesting premise - mirrors breaking and allowing our evil doppelgangers to cross over into our world. However moved very slowly and felt overly long - better as a short?

Couldn't really see where this was going in terms of plot - why did these doubles cross over? what did they plan to do? how long had they been lurking behind the mirrors? why cross now and not earlier or later? it was almost "Invasion of the Body Snatchers " minus the pods and screaming but with broken mirrors.

The whole good v's evil was all a bit trite - the evil ones walked really slowly, with an air of haughtiness/disdain and silent knowing looks and the good ones looked a bit worried and confused ... ummm k

broken

Posted: Mon Aug 25, 2008 2:32 am
by kaiju
just plain boring

Posted: Mon Aug 25, 2008 7:58 am
by MaxRenn
Drifted in and out a bit in the first half and basically couldn't make any sense of it at all. Every time I drifted off I seemed to wake up and she was still in the bloody bathroom staring in the mirror.

****HUGE GREAT SPOILER****










The ending...

...basically Phil Kaufman's Invasion of the Body Snatchers remake wasn't it?

Posted: Mon Aug 25, 2008 9:02 am
by Terria
Reasonable premise but just too many plotholes for me and bits just didn't make sense.

Posted: Mon Aug 25, 2008 10:00 am
by Muffy St. John
This movie is seriously one of the worst I've ever seen, not badly made though, just BAD! It's hard to understand how a script that is SO bad can get such funding.... only in America?

Posted: Mon Aug 25, 2008 10:31 am
by JoeyBroChill
Friggin atrocious!

Let me pick a few nuts out of this steaming turd of a movie:

1. How many times do you want to repeat that car crash sequence?!
2. Doctor: 'Its not uncommon, but its rare' WHAT?!
3. 'I...think...something...is...going...to...happen...to...dad' 'Slow down, your not making sense!'

The torture sequences in Martyrs should have involved watching this shite!

Posted: Mon Aug 25, 2008 8:51 pm
by jonbly
Ran madly around in circles delivering cheap shocks, but never engaged. And that's one really selective bout of amnesia...

Posted: Tue Aug 26, 2008 12:55 am
by AdeBrown
The more I balance this with Mirrors the more this one wins.
But I agree with some of the shortcomings mentioned above.

There's an excellent novella by China Mieville called The Tain, where our reflections break into our world much like the ones in the story.
(His story is set some time afterwards though.)

So, I got a sense of the reflections having a grudge about being behind the mirror all of the time. Sadly the emphasis on the five family members gave no indication of what was going on elsewhere - a couple of random mirror-shatterings off camera. Some moody shots of London.

I liked the "twist".

It wins over Mirrors by a technical knockout of better internal logic.

Re: The Broken

Posted: Tue Aug 26, 2008 11:24 am
by The Soapmaker
DavieT wrote:Couldn't really see where this was going in terms of plot - why did these doubles cross over? what did they plan to do?
They planned to do exactly what the people they'd replaced did... BUT with sinister little smirks on their faces. Scary.

Posted: Tue Aug 26, 2008 11:46 am
by rambozo
I'm waiting for the film that combines the current trends...

Lower class kids WITH mirrors - now THAT's scary!

Posted: Tue Aug 26, 2008 1:23 pm
by Scrof the Return
Seriously dull and uneventful, despite the presence of the rather lovely Lena Headey. It's interesting how a slower pace worked so well for LTROI but failed so badly here, probably because there's just not enough to engage our interest here.
Check out the 1972 Roger Moore film The Man Who Haunted Himself for a far more satisfactory exploration of a very similair theme.

Posted: Tue Aug 26, 2008 2:47 pm
by Jekyll
Boring boring boring.

Posted: Tue Aug 26, 2008 3:46 pm
by Fenriz
The only film I actually dropped off to sleep during.

zzzzzzzzzzzzzz, total snorefest. Can hardly even remember plot cos it was THAT dull - something about a car crash, broken mirror, doppelganger, her dad's not her dad, her boyfriend's not her boyfriend, something something.....zzzzzzzzzzzz.

2.5/10

Posted: Tue Aug 26, 2008 4:03 pm
by Hello Doris!
The car crash repeat became ridiculous in the end (or so seen in Mirrors with all the mirrors breaking).

Yes I know it cost a lot of money to make but repeating it 20 odd times does nothing to save the film only highlight the fact that they couldn't be arsed to put in a street in the background.

Not the worst of the weekend, but not the best. Within 20 minutes you could see where it was heading.

Posted: Tue Aug 26, 2008 4:38 pm
by odishon
Liked the shots from inside the mirrors looking out.

Good production values but every scene felt like a build up to something with a huge musical score and yet no delivery. This became very frustrating about half way through and made me switch off.