Film Number 36 – The Nest
After an unsuccessful attempt at finding Luc Besson’s stamp of approval on the credits I went into today film with no knowledge what so ever about what would follow. The Nest begins in true tension every shot is constantly revealing new elements, expanding the story and the list of characters further. We are introduced to three different teams- a crack squad of master thieves, a special forces unit driving an armored vehicle transporting one of Europe’s most connected crime lords and two guards of a warehouse.
The story builds and builds and builds and bores. Nearly 35 minutes into the film and we have had far more introductions and back story then we ever needed. The mind set of the film descends when a master thief breaks into a communications building doing needless acrobatics and various parkour stunts in slow mo with cool camera angles. When is this flashy shit going to stop? Parkour is only effective in a film if it is needed; a man does not need to do a double backflip of a small ledge if there is a ladder right next to him. So this lone acrobat makes his way to a very big plug and removes it causing an entire telecoms company to halt. Yep you’ve read that right a simple plug and a phone network goes down. So the build continues, the master criminals get into a warehouse hold the guards hostage and begin to load up all the electronic merchandise in the building.
Only blocks away the armored vehicle with the deadly Albanian crime lord aboard is ambushed by a ridiculous amount of henchman, the two living Special Forces guards manage to drive into the warehouse that is conveniently being robbed. From there on out the whole situation plays out continuous death and lots of mindless shooting and killing. The ridiculous amount of buildup really hurts this film all this complicated exposition just to corner ever character into this one building is very unneeded. The last hour of the film is a bit like a French Assault on Precinct 13 with more people.
As the film plays out it becomes hard to tell if these are good actors or not, I always find it difficult to tell if a foreign actors delivery can be considered believable or even decent because I have nothing to base it on. I can’t speak French and don’t know what tones and subtle nuances can ruin a performance, obviously I can say whether an actor grabbed me, and got me invested in the film or at least in a scene; the last hour of The Nest felt like watching a boring video game. No heart, no thought, everything felt so mindless. Quick editing without any rhythm; no action scene had time to be followed or enjoyed.
The visual flair that made the beginning of the film ends very quickly also and every scene and shot becomes incredibly unmemorable, I’m sure within a few days I will have almost no recollection. The film definitely tried to evoke John Carpenters Assault on Precinct 13, the situation is very similar and there are references to that film scattered everyone, each one just reminding me how awesome that film is and making me want to watch it again.
4 out of 10
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