Nightmare Alley (2021)

Nightmare Alley (2021) Ah, I’m going to be frowned upon again, maybe even hated! People are going to tell me that I haven’t understood anything and that I’m always going against the grain on purpose!

But yes, that’s right: I didn’t like this film! Apart from a certain flair for photography, the film is an abysmal bore. It takes an inordinate amount of time to finally get to the plot, which I really struggled to grasp. Before that, we’ll have stumbled along for an hour and seen a rather tiresome scattering of secondary characters that the director will abandon fairly quickly, one after the other, without us being able to understand why they were introduced to us. The impression that no character ever becomes a subject.

Once again, everything I hate about Guillermo is here. No, you can’t say that I love this director. I don’t jump for joy every time he makes a new film and if he stopped directing, I wouldn’t have a problem with it. I hated Cronos (1992) even back then.

Pan’s Labyrinth (2006), which is considered by many to be his best, caused quite a stir! It’s indeed a film to be seen once, with a brilliant ending… but that, alas, is what just about saves the film. Otherwise it would have been a throwaway. The monsters are frightening and the atmosphere is as creepy as you could wish, but the excessive violence is just unnecessary. You don’t need to go into such detail to feel the horror of the situation.

The Shape of Water (2017) is disturbing, unsettling, hyper-weird… but it’s just a good film. Not to be recommended to everyone, at the risk of sounding like a madman. I was never a fan of Pacific Rim (2013) and Del Toro didn’t convince me either as a writer in the catastrophic Don’t be afraid of the Dark (2010).

Tip: Don’t be afraid of this film, because it’s really bad! In fact, I only really like Guillermo Del Toro when he tackles superheroes. In fact, I love Blade 2 (2002), as well as the two Hellboy films (2004 and 2008). So… no, I don’t like this director’s universe and atmosphere.

Some people say it’s people like Tim Burton who are too weird. To each his own! Right, then! Let’s go back to this film. Violent, boring, heavy-handed, I wasn’t interested in any of the characters, I wasn’t attached to any of them, it’s just too long, far too long…

We go from one scene to another without subtlety, in a totally disjointed way. What a disappointment! As I was saying, the cinematography and the actors are fine (in fact, I think they’re brave!), but what a profound bore!!! No, frankly, it breaks my heart to say it, but this was a film to avoid for me.

Only the cast deserves five stars. After that, I don’t agree with everyone who also hated this film. For example, I don’t think the ending is too obvious and I don’t think the actors are always in the same vein. Nor do I think the ending is botched.

On the contrary, the actors are incredible and the end of the film is quite interesting. The film keeps trotting out back-stories, characters and clues, and I can’t say why the script goes in one direction rather than another. I really dislike this film. I found it too heavy.

I came away feeling bored and disgusted. Frankly, I hated it and this creepy atmosphere will probably weigh on me long after I’ve seen it.Very Big Disappointment!!!