Little Sparrows (Camille Chen Yu-Hsiu, 2010) wr. Camille Chen Yu-Hsiu ; Nicola Bartlett, James Hagan, Nina Deasley, Melanie Munt, Arielle Gray, Scott Jackson, Nick Candy, Whitney Richards, Nick Gray, Simon Lockwood; drama; 88 min.
Chen Yu-Hsiu may have some right to claim direction of Little Sparrows - someone must have assembled the actors in front of the camera and said 'action' – but her claim to have written a script seems dubious. The cast are clearly improvising, and not very succinctly.
So: a women with a family dies of cancer. She seemed to have died about 25 minutes in, which would have been fine with me. But there are the usual ninety or so minutes. You get that.
The film is dominated by Nicola Bartlett, who seems to be a good actress but has no lines to work with, so she falls back on a mind-numbing collection of 'you know's and 'OK's in her major speeches, which are the backbone of the movie.
There are other actors in it who also seem to be very good, but they have no creative material. I hope they'll all get other opportunities – but not the director, who should consider making babies or anything else away from an industry that is very expensive not just in money but also in actors' careers.
Garry Gillard | New: 22 October, 2012 | Now: 28 October, 2021