The Gist:
Based on the events of a night he had in Soho back in 2002, ‘Lost in London’ was both Woody Harrelson’s directorial debut and the first movie to be live-streamed to cinemas. But, short of that novelty, how does it hold up as a movie in its own right?
The Review:
Right from the off, ‘Lost in London’ is different to a lot of movies. When a low budget movie is shot, it lives and dies based on the dialogue and the skill of its actors. In spite of the significant resources behind the production and initial broadcast, ‘Lost in London’ embodies this as well. As the entire production was filmed and broadcast live, the movie is basically one long scene. The only time-skip in the entire production is towards the end of the movie and is performed by moving the hands of the clock on the wall while the camera is pointing away. Therefore, without the luxury of significant special effects, everything rests on the performance of Harrelson and his co-stars and the quality of the script to keep things flowing.
And, incredibly, they do. During a one-hundred-minute runtime, the cast pulls off their roles damn near perfectly.
As for the plot itself, Harrelson seems to take a significant amount of glee in portraying himself as almost entirely unsympathetic for most of the movie. Over the course of the night’s events, he punches Owen Wilson in the face, takes back money from a homeless man in a wheelchair because he needs it for a taxi, rips the ashtray out of said taxi and then attempts to flee, when the police are called, in another taxi. The events of the plot are kicked off when his wife finds out about a recent affair he had; which only goes public because he attempted to haggle with the lawyer, he tried to employ to keep it quiet. As most of the events detailed above are based on real events of that night, this seems to be Harrelson’s effort to avoid ducking responsibility. Regardless of this, the events of the movie make for an entertaining story.
As the quotes from Harrelson’s friends and associates at the start show, he chose a hell of a challenge for his first attempt at directing and he definitely makes an impressive showing of it. Nevertheless, he’s restrained by the nature of the project; there are very few changes of perspective throughout. And while the cast does a heroic job of keeping things fresh and interesting, the ‘one long scene’ nature of the movie does bring a certain amount of story fatigue at points.
The Verdict:
This was clearly a passion project and it shows with the quality of the finished product. Harrelson and the rest of the cast pull off a stunning performance considering that it was done in just one take. Nevertheless, the hoops they had to leap through do leave a few rough edges.
Certificate: 12
Director: Woody Harrelson
Starring: Woody Harrelson, Eleanor Matsuura, Owen Wilson, Willie Nelson, Martin McCann, Sean Power, Amir El-Masry, David Mumeni, David Avery, Nathan Willcocks, Bono (voice), Ali Hewson (voice) and Daniel Radcliffe.
Running Time: 100 minutes
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