Wild
Horses
Film: Broken Horses
Cast: Chris Marquette, Anton
Yelchin, Vincent D'OnofrioDirected by: Vidhu Vinod Chopra
Duration: 1 hr 47 mins
Rating: * * *
Producer Director Vidhu Vinod
Chopra takes a plunge in the west with Broken
Horses, an English adaptation of his 1989 hit Parinda. The result is a mixed bag, some of it is satisfying while
the rest doesn’t quite rise above the ordinary at times. Set on the U.S.-
Mexico border, he along with co-writer Abhijat Joshi serves us a modern day western
.
The prologue tells us about the
two brothers, Bud (Chris Marquette) and Jake (Anton Yelchin, Chekov from the
rebooted Star Trek) with the former
being very protective about his younger sibling, their father was gunned down
by an unknown person. Several years later, Jake had become a violinist in New York while the elder
brother has joined a gang lead by Hench (Vincent D'Onofrio) who manipulates him
into committing crimes.
Just before his wedding Jake
visits his brother and there he learns about his brothers nefarious activities.
In the crossfire, he himself gets caught. Oddly enough, we never learn nor
understand why he never replies to any of his fiancées and ends up becoming a
one track pony.
There are no surprises in the
story unless you count Buster Keaton’s The
General playing in an antiquated theatre while the gangsters are having a
conversation. Chopra’s visual flair is visible in many scenes and even though
the character development doesn’t contribute much to the screenplay, the film
still chugs along without too much impediment. The primary reason for that is
there isn’t much extra baggage at 107 minutes it is quite crisp and at the end
of the day, this is still a good vs evil story with some shades of grey.
Cinematographer Tom Stern (a
Clint Eastwood regular) captures the scenic beauty quite impressively. The
performances are ordinary – at times you get the sense that the actors are
unsure of what exact expression they should have, Anton Yelchin for example has
a grimace on his face all the time.
Broken Horses is a decent effort,
the screen play should have packed a stronger punch though.
Published in The Navhind Times on 12th April 2015
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