Review: White Noise

Every once in a while, you get one of those ambitious projects where it based off a book that has labelled as 'unfilmable'.

It doesn't always work. But my most favourite example is Cloud Atlas, one of my favourite films of the past ten years.

We have Noam Baumbach giving it a go with his latest venture. I always like the choices Baumbach makes and usually really enjoy his films. Particularly his last outing with the great 'Marriage Story'.

This was certainly a change of pace from Baumbach's regular works. It's hard to know where to start with this. But if in doubt, I'll start at the beginning.

The first half felt like a quirky, surreal, satirical, arthouse version of 'Vacation' with a section likened to 'Close Encounters Of The Third Kind'. I was liking the production design. It created a really strange reality that felt like a Tim Burton feature.

I was also enjoying at how eccentric it was and how it showed the American way of living, society in general and how we process information given by the media.

Then the second half focused more on some of its earlier themes such as social commentary and the consequences of consumerism. But its execution felt a bit incoherent and was shifting between genre's that didn't feel right.

Then it decided to end with a musical sequence that could well be a guilty pleasure moment for me.

For someone who hasn't read the book, I could see why it is celebrated novel through the script. It was interesting on the whole. But the dialogue for each character never felt that that was them actually talking and having those thoughts. It just felt like they were talking like the author. A bit like a poor man's Quentin Tarantino in that aspect.

I felt the cast did the best they could with what they were given. Adam Driver felt like he was channelling a combination of Chevy Chase and Alan Partridge. Greta Gerwig had some nice dramatic moments in the second half and fitted the look of the film perfectly.

Don Cheadle was good value, it's always great seeing Raffey Cassidy, Andre Benjamin and an almost unrecognisable Jodie Turner-Smith.

I was a great a strange feeling from seeing this. One that I very rarely get. It's that despite my issues with it and labelling it a hot mess, I kind of dug it. There is so much going on and its strange that while it is clear that not everything works, it intrigued me enough to not fully care about its problems. I think what worked for me were that it contained many strangely entertaining individual scenes. But it was hard to put them together and make it a cohesive story.

So many people are going to hate this. It's very up itself at times, snobbish and people will find it annoying by the end. Obviously if you've read the book, you will already have an idea of what to expect. But most audiences that are not aware of the book will find this odd and a waste of time.

For me, I could see the ideas there and that it wasn't all working and connecting. But I somehow remained intrigued and into it just about.

I can see others like me walking a fine between weirdly enjoying it and being confused and possibly frustrated by it. But despite me just about giving it a pass, I cannot recommend this. It's just too out there to be accessible for a mainstream audience.

Rating: 7/10