Genres

Visitors Review

Mike B 2013-06-17 19:03:02

Well Intentioned but amateurish at times

Although this film is well intentioned it does have some amateurishqualities to it. It is about an Iraq war veteran and he is experiencingpost traumatic stress. Dash Mihok plays this role of the returningveteran very well – which is less than I can say for the person(Spencer Clark) who is allegedly filming the documentary on him.The style is cinema-verite which I found gave a voyeuristic feel. Alsothere are these useless diversions – shots of the sky, the trees in theforest…. And what was the point of showing these ballet dancers? Theyhad absolutely nothing to do with the topic. Plus some of theconversations with Spencer Clark seemed to drift needlessly – too muchself-absorption.But the overall theme of PTSD is very sympathetically handled – attimes riveting.

talia-filmgirl 2013-06-17 04:34:55

Great acting, serious drama

I haven't seen this in a theater, only on a DVD, but I was very movedby the story and the performances. Without giving anything away, I cansay it is the story of a soldier who comes back from Iraq. Dash Mihok(he was in The Thin Red Line - another really impressive performance asa soldier by him, I thought) plays the soldier and I think this movieis worth seeing for many reasons (like it's message for one), but hisperformance is one of the top reasons. I hope he can win some award forthis. I have seen him in other films but I didn't recognize him atfirst and I thought (and so did my friend) that he was actually a vet,not an actor. The actor who plays his friend is also excellent, SpencerClark, who has been in lots of films. You'll recognize his face. Thestory is well told and the film looks beautiful (which is nice andimpressive for such a sad story), and I found many of the scenes verysurprising and shocking. It is slow at the beginning, but theirfriendship is very sad and moving, and the film's message is verypowerful and worth everyone seeing.