Can there be anything more exciting than a perfect thriller? In terms of cinema, few things are as intellectually engrossing as an attempt to puzzle out a whodunit. It fills in the audiences with anxiousness and makes a movie or TV program even more involving. However, it is really difficult to find a good thriller that truly bites its viewers. We consider recent biggies like Prisoners, Oldboy, Parasite, Se7en and Inception as great examples of unflawed thillers while others in this genre should do so too.
In 2023 so far, fans of thriller movies have been satisfied. Missing and Knock at the Cabin have not only been the best thrillers this year but also among the best ones within this decade. Nonetheless, there have been many who failed to draw their audience into complex puzzles; unfortunately The Man from Rome is one of those.
The movie The Man from Rome based on Arturo Pérez-Reverte’s book La Piel Del Tambor revolves around Father Quart (Richard Armitage) who is sent on an investigation when a hacker breaches Vatican’s security delivering an anonymous plea which threatens the pope and the entire Vatican. As this mystery unravels Father Quart learns some dark secrets about Vatican City that many would kill for.
The Man from Rome is one film we had hoped to love. Its’ concept and central themes are undeniably engaging and it has got a wonderful cast. Besides, how can we fail to anticipate for such an intriguing premise around the secrets of Vatican City? Sadly this does fall short of its target audiences at times however because; its mystery is just too labyrinthine thus causes a step back effect upon viewership plus zero anxiety levels make it flop even further.
There are some action scenes that try to keep you engaged here and there; unfortunately they fail miserably at that too. Shaky camming was something we thought was gone for good and made action scenes annoying, but not in The Man from Rome. This movie contains many cinematic sins, which even a confession might not wash away.
The idea that the Vatican is like an MI5 with highly trained, intelligent operatives is genius. The beginning of the film features the Vatican’s might and amazing technology that gives it a feel of a James Bond movie only making fans anticipate future events in it. Even title sequence in the film seems Bond-like albeit bland and uninspiring thereby indicating to viewers what kind of a film they are watching at this point.
The Man from Rome, despite being a strong idea, is still compelling. Apart from the beginning of the movie, it does not indulge in its absurdity. Let’s not pretend that being an Italian MI5 for the Vatican isn’t mad, so it would have been much more fun if they owned that and had a blast with it. The style of The Man from Rome should have leaned towards John Wick franchise if at all this movie would have been thrilling.
Father Quart suggests having sex with Macarena Burner (Amaia Salamanca) which is off-putting to say the least given his role within the Church as well as Vatican priesthood. It is strange and unnecessary, and indeed some violation of sacred rules for a person who is in Church or even particularly someone representing the Vatican itself. Yes, they are technically special agents but still hold beliefs like any other priest or church member.
There is nothing wrong with slow-burners as long as we’re engrossed in what’s happening to the plot and characters in the movie. Additionally, no one has reason for complaint when they get scared or tense due to certain movies. However, The Man from Rome can lead to remarking about various things about this movie. Even at its first moments, there are too many twists involved in its main plot and mystery. A lot of characters introduced throughout this story make audiences walk away before understanding where it’s heading at any moment only to show up somewhere later on in the film. Also included through out the movie are several subplots that are just completely uninteresting. There are few twists along side these lines; however many audiences won’t care enough about them anyways leaving them rather irrelevant.
As earlier observed above there are some action scenes but again they don’t quite hit their mark either way. Granted it is not primarily an action film so some consideration can be accorded hereafter All things considered though and in light of the fact that the music is forgettable and also doesn’t enhance any of the adrenaline that it should, this action becomes uninspiring as well.
Finally, The Man from Rome is one hundred twenty minutes long just to put icing on the cake. It would not matter at all if this film was tight, thrilling, mysterious and entertaining but it’s not. A crisp 90 minutes would have done the job just right, cutting out many unimportant characters and subplots that overcomplicated the movie, and all in all would have made for a less aggravating watch.
To make matters worse for the movie, the performances in the film were just not working well. Richard Armitage did a good job here but he didn’t do much to raise his character up. Regrettably, it was other cast members that couldn’t perform on their own probably because it is an English-language movie for some strange reason. Perhaps it was to reach a wider audience, but this was done at the expense of a weaker product. We had such strong reasons to believe that if their dialogue were in their native language, these Italian actors would have acted better and more genuinely. This would have worked best for both actors and the film.
For all of that though we can hardly blame them as they had poor material and dialogue to start with. Many times through dialogues just did not flow and characters used very bizarre answers which could be termed poetic somehow but unfortunately they were not successful at this. The Man from Rome should have stayed in Rome after all.
Watch free movies on Fmovies
