eyeintrees

I didn't expect much from a free film on youtube. Not only were all the actors simply amazing, it was human at its deepest level.

One review here tells of 'too many subplots'... I think they were watching something else. There are character stories that blend and converge to create a story of love and humility, of human fragility and tenderness and of struggle and greatness.

If you think it's going to be hard watching a movie about a character that has cerebral palsy, this gem is not difficult and neither is it trashy or sentimental and made for a quick grab audience, like so many movies made about people who live with disabilities.

Beautiful.

Beautiful singing, simply beautiful. A quiet movie that doesn't seek to work out too many themes, and that worked for me. It focused on a gifted boy, a stroke of good fortune and an opportunity of a lifetime. Some themes were a little formulaic but I forgave that due to the very good acting from all and some of the words given to the boys by Dustin Hoffman's character near the end, which were simply beautiful and perfect and what every single young person in the world should hear at some time. This is a very good film with a fine focus on the importance of human striving and creativity. We don't get a chance to see other themes that another director may have thrown in and, frankly, I was grateful, as I simply wanted what it was, not another family 'victim/showdown/misery-fest; which muddies almost every single saturated thing these days. Wonderful and highly recommended.

Here's the thing: in a time of genuine crises, it is not the appropriate time to stand up for a long-past principle involving a dead father who it's hinted used to abuse you. This is not the time to try and deal with the children's grandmother's issues of deep, dark denial about it. Put the kids with grannie, who no longer has an abuser in the house, go find a proper home like good parents do, who have a working father, and then later, when all is well, go get your kids and never go back to granny's house if need be. This is the type of stupidity that families love to indulge in, high drama and misery and mixed pain and suffering. Parents can deal with their own issues another day. Immediate need is just that. This was a stupid, annoying, long winded watch which I expected to actually be about real homeless people who would never throw so much as ONE chip away, let alone have a 'light relief' food fight. Not a real rendition of suffering. Just one of pride and over breeding. Usually Irish movies are excellent. This was not.

I haven't read the book. The reason being that I find much of the books written about rich, idle, boring people in that era, tedious; a time waste and immeasurably dull beyond belief. So I suppose it 'not being anything like the book', which all the 1,2,3 & 4 scoring reviews keep telling us about, is a very, very good thing.

It's an excellent film and an intelligent one. Absolutely recommended!

I waited a long time to see this movie. I should have kept waiting. This is a prime example of how someone making a film who doesn't know how, also doesn't know how to interpret a book, I would imagine. But I loathed this truly regrettable uninspiring piece of cement-drying dullness so much that I wouldn't read the book now if it came with a million dollars. And I think that is a vicious thing to do to any author!!

What was it trying to say? A statement about deaf people? A statement about how kids are treated and not heard? A statement about anything at all?

Good direction and a decent script, a few subtitles and it should have been at least watchable. However, because I kept waiting for the big reveal, I forced myself to keep watching at the 15 minute mark, 25 minutes, 55 minutes and then, with gritted teeth the rest of this hash job. The 'big reveal' comes to you with little paper people with pasted heads on and ANOTHER story... typed on little bits of paper during a bus ride.

Horrible muck. Should have been good. Wasn't. Please, can we have a proper director do a re-make.

Amazing, all these years I avoided this movie in case it was drivel. Instead, finally, I watched after finding nothing of interest, thinking I was compromising but it was simply wonderful. Beautifully acted, charming, funny, Shakespeare performed beautifully. I usually hate the liberties taken with 'historical' fiction but this was simply the best fun. Highly recommend this masterfully made gem.

What I wrote above! X 100. Of all the incredible and amazing places they could have gone with this, no, they chose propaganda garbage, so that 'Diana can save the world.' Of all the unscrupulous trash. Wasted actors, wasted dollars, wasted story. Garbage.

The 1993 version was utter rubbish. The steam punk version should be banned for horrors unto the book. This was superb. This is the closest to how I remember, (not exact, but close) on reading this as a girl, that Mary would have felt in that ugly, indolent aristocratic dwelling and how she would have felt on discovering the 'garden.' They have taken far less stupid and pointless liberties with the book than the other versions and have retained the most important point: adults ruled, even incredibly stupid, self-absorbed ones, that children were not considered too important, that outright child abuse is closer than 'nice' people think and that ultimately, nature has a way of showing us something much more than we seem to contain, ourselves. Exquisite to look at. Delightfully astute. Beautifully acted. I read some of the reviews... seems a large portion of the reviewers have this version mixed up with that trash made in 1993 and the others with that ghastly steam punk abomination. If you're a reader who loved the book. If you're a garden and nature lover. If you love dogs. If you understand that children require listening to and nurturing. If you have a clue about how messed up some parents are. This is a wonderful, wonderful film. Watch it. Slow, real, beautiful.

I thought Once was an incredible movie but this little film was also excellent.

Much better than I thought it would be, it entertained and worked very well.

Highly recommended. You won't be disappointed.

In a nutshell. Her parents colluded in a nasty little deal with aristocrats, (we learn this right at the very end. 'This is a tradition your parents began.') Possibly to enhance and to ensure their large millinery, with it's fancy hats for the elite, would never go broke... we must remember that old Europe was all about 2 classes and that was rich and slaves/servants.

The hat store burned down, killing the parents and she was sent away at two.

On later finding her long-lost brother. I realised, after the film was over, that perhaps, with his penchant for ethics and dare I say it, treating people as human beings, it may very well have been him who designed that situation. Three quarter way through the film, he pretty much says as much. '...burn that shop down and end this forever.' His group of rebels are seen as only that and here, the brilliance of showing how, even back then, the media is manipulated to only show the 'truths' they want people to hear.

So in the way of vampirical aristocracy, and so rife in the day, and throughout history, this is basically a story about the abuse and theft of the lives of innocents. Mainly women, seen here so clearly as the 'sacrifice', the 'chosen one' to be abominated by those with power - very powerful men.

Clearly shown, no matter what the class, women never did fare well at the hands of men - whether it is the marauding men who revolt at the upper class, potentially to do 'the right thing' and yet, in their wake, leaving such rape and pillage that we see they have no control over their base natures. Or the elite, those craven filthy aristocrats who take what they want, create wars and rape and pillage but 'dress it up a little as if it's a beautiful thing they do', and therein, my take on this, is the sacrifice of the beautiful, sweet and tender women, sent to deliver 'hats' to ostensibly be used for royalty, with the promise of a better life, only to be vampirised by men in fine clothing - no open, overt 'marauding' here... just the insidious clawing of evil depravity - as they do with war to make money, as they do the environment to make money as all innocent and unprotected life is abominated to make money and to keep their power.

It's a war, as depicted right at the end. And this movie mesmerises you the entire way through, confusing you entirely, leading you, just as the back of her neck does... leads as her day goes from a crisp, clean collar to a rumpled one and later, needing to burn the clothing she wears entirely, after she has almost mindlessly and yet unwaveringly, decided to get to the bottom 'of it all.'

Ugly truths, particularly about how our lives are ruled by elites, how women are brutalised at the hands of men, how people will hide truths and do whatever it takes to stay wealthy and protected.

I was totally confused by this when it ended. It took a few hours of hard thinking to get to this. Brilliant, mesmerising and utterly uncomfortable. It is an ugly truth, glaring hard and cruelly at us. We are all enslaved by those in power and by money - and women are the eternal sacrifice to the world of men. (Unless we change it. Thank you #Metoo.) I must add that months later, the implications of how these young women, all lovely with so much to give in life, are chosen to be abominated, abused, raped and tortured, months later, gives me the horrors. I wonder how much of this has gone on 'for covert profit' in those times. If you have issues of horror related to rape, torture of women, beating of women, gratuitious cruelty toward women then I very, very strongly urge you not to watch this film.

Despite it's Oscar win, I had not heard of this film and stumbled across it on a cloudy day when I wanted desperately to see a movie that had substance and beauty, as there seem to be so few left. I couldn't have found anything better - exquisitely beautiful and moving me to tears on more than one occasion, which is a rare thing for me in an era of false sentiment and schmaltz. This movie is neither of those, telling a deceptively complex and yet humanly simple story of a young man who takes on a job that others despise and makes it a work of art and compassionate career choice. It would take too long to describe all the aspects here that touched, moved and resonated with me. Suffice to say that only in 'foreign' films can one find this depth and serenity in a film, a work of art, a gem, a masterpiece. If you veer away from the nonsense that is mainstream, trashy movie-making, I would urge you to watch this for its sheer humanity and resounding beauty.

Ok, for all the tools who made a point of hating this film so much with your truly moronic reviews, I'm going to say this:

Today, this is exactly the film I needed. It gave me a beautiful Tuscan villa to look at, the spectacular Tuscan hills, reminded me of my mother's superb, impeccable simply fantastic cuisine, took me away from the mundanity of anglo saxon bleakness, gave me some great music to hear, gave me good actors doing some interesting stuff regarding reconciling parent/son stuff.

I don't care about the little cliches, the faults and the flaws. It was a lovely film to watch, it had nice intentions and it was the type of film that I didn't want to end because our real world is so wrought for cell phones, signage and garbage. And this was not. It was beautiful on many levels and that's what I needed today. Thank you.

As for the creep who reviewed this lovely, quiet film and retold it because they thought this was about 'rich man's problems', your retelling was horrible, cruel and vicious and you are a truly vile person.

Thank you to this lovely, simple movie today. I loved it. And didn't cringe a bit because sometimes life is just a little like this for all of us.

Another reviewer states that the savvy young woman in this film would have played her cards differently. They really don't understand young women and how truly vulnerable they can be, particularly if they've never had to problem solve before due to being wealthy, young, pretty and having a great job thrown their way because of cushy connections. All of that doesn't make you strong but just as naive as the next person with more showiness attached. So, moving past that, at about the 46 minute mark this movie kicks into top gear and goes 'vroom!' I don't know anything about the giant circus they call politics, particularly the truly absurd American game, other than it's dirty and has been since time immemorial... hence the title. If you see them smile and say lovely things to each other up their on the podium, sure, they absolutely have made a filthy, knock your socks off deal and still despise each other with a passion, but hey, the people want CIRCUS and if it gives us power then let them eat cake!

An excellent showcase of pretty faces, deep down ugly people and how one youngish man cuts his teeth for all time on the edge of a knife to become a power monger amongst the devil's henchmen. I didn't expect to like it much but it a great watch. Ryan Gosling was excellent. One thing: spoiler alert - In fact, and what a huge thing to muck up by the film makers, he DID have evidence and didn't need to make up a story about a 'note'. There was a phone call made by the politician in question to the girl at 2am in the morning. Easily traceable and would have made the ending more credible but I guess they wanted to play games with us and see how well we'd been watching and also take some very close-ups of Clooney being an actor, although I will admit it was all great fun to watch. The other thing: not sure if we were supposed to figure this out of feel our 'hero' had been hard done by. But frankly, he was the perfect person to continue on in politics. He's a liar and an opportunist. He lies to his superior and then pretends he's an innocent. Not really. His superior was in fact correct in treating him badly... he's um, a liar and he knows it's going against everything that he should be doing. And perfect for politics because he doesn't care who he's going to take down to satisfy his massive, entitled ego. A good watch. But cleverly made to want you to think he's a really nice guy. Snort.

Brilliant acting from Andrew Scott and the rest of the cast are all good. It deviates from pure formulaic quite a bit at one point, so when your mind begins to think it knows what's going to happen, it doesn't really. Excellent and worth the watch.

Uncomfortable, painful, ugly, annoying, captivating. Not for the faint hearted. Ugly violence of the repulsive kind. Ugly people. Ugly life stories. Hope somewhere in there. Worth watching if you want truth.

From the first moments to the last, this is a sit-tight film. Excellent in its execution, acting, script, realism, directing, truths and heart. Violent and ugly and also powerfully heartfelt. Brilliant and real.

Excellent, super acting, superb script, frighteningly apt to the world we live in today. "This business doesn't grow, it makes acquisitions..." Welcome to the early warnings of globalisation and business filth. Absolutely worth the watch if you love a tight script and great actors... and aren't afraid of the truth.

I was bored for about 15 minutes and then it got good. Really good. I would recommend it for an amazing story of guts and sheer brilliance. Good performances and well paced, as it progressed. A story that really needed to be made about incredible people.

I needed to go to other sources to discover just how truly extraordinary Harriet Tubman was. The movie just piqued my interest but frankly, for an account of really incredible events, I was a bit bored even though I knew I should have been fascinated. Harriet's life WAS fascinating, just not this film. It was lazy and simply reran the usual formulaic stuff and missed the mark. An ok watch if you haven't much else to do. Should have been fantastic and wasn't even close.

Delightful, Niven at his finest, Brando enchanting in a comedy role. Hilarious script and what should be terribly silly and sexist is actually great fun.

I couldn't watch more than 10 minutes. The demeaning absurdity of how black people were forced to act in these atrociously stupid films left me aghast. I'd forgotten just how horribly they were depicted, as I haven't watched an old movie this terrible in a very long time.

Much different to anything I anticipated and ten times better than expected. Wonderful, torn characters, well acted, great musical score, incredibly interesting and real food for thought. Loved this. I wish there were more films of this nature in terms of substance.

This would have been a 10 rating. But... I think Pink Floyd were sensational and visionary. This show was a great watch except for the huge lack of responsibility to one of the most maligned animals on earth. I found this lacking in forethought and horrifically thoughtless, and it ruined the entire thing for me. We abominate these innocent animals and then without thought, talking of equality for 'all'...the rot set in here. If this was the best they could come up with as an analogy for elites and autocracy then so sorry, simply horribly done and not good enough. I was incredibly disappointed. Music is great. I would have preferred to also see some 'reality' added to this message of 'equality' with perhaps the girls who are singing being of another ethnicity, ones with those really amazing, huge voices like the original DSotM had, you'll know the bit. Entertaining, too overtly political, which I found a turn off and therefore had me wondering about the message bringers, the message, why, who and what for. Otherwise, if you don't care about anything but the music, you'll love it.

A priceless GEM. Gorgeous, clever, witty, fun. This is just one of those amazing and brilliant films that delight you to bits and is never forgotten.

There have been some Australian movie gems that have been important and very watchable and this is one of them. Excellent acting, a very good, realistic script, a story that should be told. I'm not sure if in real life the ending would be quite so happy but I'm glad this one was as it felt right for this film. A must watch for any serious movie goer who appreciates reality and the human journey, friendships that go beyond and for a change, relationships that are open about fragility and vulnerability without a host of ugly games. A very good film.