FilmSnobReviews

Title: Mute
MPAA Rating: TV-MA
Director: Duncan Jones
Starring: Alexander Skarsgård, Paul Rudd, Justin Theroux
Runtime: 2 hr 4 mins

What It Is: In a futuristic Berlin a mute Leo (Skarsgård) is looking for his girlfriend Naadirah (Seyneb Saleh) who’s gone missing. Leo must submerge himself within the underbelly of Berlin’s darkest corners in order to find her. Meanwhile, an American doctor named Cactus Bill (Rudd) is doing all manner of dirty deed so he can acquire new identities for her and his daughter and get out of Berlin and back to the good ole U.S of A.

What We Think: This film got a ton of hate when it premiered on Netflix. Most of it is warranted, but not all of it. There’s a lot to like visually speaking. A ton of the characters feels like they’re awesome…they just aren’t. Rudd is not very interesting. There’s a subplot with Theroux’ weird character that should be interesting, but its dropped pretty quickly. Skarsgård is trying to do something interesting but the writing is determined to screw him over. A lot like The Legend of Tarzan. He’s here trying to put in work only to be let down by a belligerent screenplay.

Our Grade: D+, This is not the failure they’d have you think but like most Netflix originals this is just not a very good film. I found myself enjoying it at parts but just when I was getting super into it something would happen to take me out. What’s worse was the ending left me wholly unfulfilled. I can recommend this one for people who aren’t going to look into the story too much and instead want to see something visually stunning. The film certainly has that going for it. Looking outside of that there’s nothing much else to enjoy. Proceed with caution.