Narration- voice-over

Just a brief one.
I watched 'Brooklyn Rules' last night with Johan. We changed DvDs 3 times!
We watched 'Little Fish' first, and I really liked it; but I can feel the effect of conventional narrative on me....that I am not used to some fragmented/hand-held/out of focus/no-focus or drama shots anymore.
Then we tried the should-be-crap film 'Dracula'. I got too scared and we both thought it's going to be crappy.

Brooklyn rules. I thought it would be another take on the Goodfellas. And I thought it would be quite boring as well...the same old story over and over again. But it was actually decent and quite cute.

But the thing I want to talk about in here is the use of narration-voice-over.
I think whenever I think about voice-over, I think about Martin Scorsese first. He uses them brilliantly and it was still surprising to see the actors acting out a different level and layer of their characters. However, it has been used in so many American movies (i think) in such a smooth, omnipresent way, that without actually watching the film, you would not really miss that much without looking at the visual elements, plus the acting. It is so easy to follow the story but then, for the first time, i felt that this is really bad for a film. That it reduces the amount of things you can enjoy in a film.

It does not reveal. It simply torn up everything for you.

Still, it is a quite good-hearted, heard warming little film. It is just not interesting at all. It is like drinking soft-drink rather than water. It does not excite you, but it sort of comforts you and keeps you busy enough. Oh well, I need to watch more films again!

Remind myself to read about Murholland drive.