Garage Days
| Year: | 2002 |
| Director: | Alex Proyas |
| Writer: | Alex Proyas |
| Cast: | Kick Gurry, Pia Miranda, Maya Stange, Marton Csokas |
A huge departure from Alex Proyas' earlier work on (the far superior) Dark City and The Crow. After crafting a very distinctive cyberpunk look in Hollywood with those two films, it looks like he did a Phillip Noyce, wanting to return to Australia and work on material closer to his heart and origins.
And despite some funny sequences, it mostly misses the mark. Tanking at the box office with barely a whimper, it tells of the struggle of inner city Australian rock bands trying to make it in the face of the fabricated dance music scene and poker machines chipping away at their market.
The story is pretty full, packed with not only the band's struggle with the world but their own internal conflicts. Sex, drugs, the Australian rock scene, even psychosis are touched on.
The setup is mostly believable but the acting is terrible hammy at times and Proyas' neat directing tricks - playing with effects and onscreen presentation - vary from the interesting to the irritating.
Kiwi Marton Csokas is making a pretty big name for himself internationally, but it appears that the careers of Looking for Alibrandi leads Kick Gurry and Pia Miranda have been hamstrung. Maya Stange is pretty sexy in an innocent party-girl way, but Pia Miranda is so pixie-ish with her huge cheeky grin that having an audience believe she's a sexually potent, rebellious bass player stretches credibility.
Not quite a bomb, but definitely not the bomb either.
And despite some funny sequences, it mostly misses the mark. Tanking at the box office with barely a whimper, it tells of the struggle of inner city Australian rock bands trying to make it in the face of the fabricated dance music scene and poker machines chipping away at their market.
The story is pretty full, packed with not only the band's struggle with the world but their own internal conflicts. Sex, drugs, the Australian rock scene, even psychosis are touched on.
The setup is mostly believable but the acting is terrible hammy at times and Proyas' neat directing tricks - playing with effects and onscreen presentation - vary from the interesting to the irritating.
Kiwi Marton Csokas is making a pretty big name for himself internationally, but it appears that the careers of Looking for Alibrandi leads Kick Gurry and Pia Miranda have been hamstrung. Maya Stange is pretty sexy in an innocent party-girl way, but Pia Miranda is so pixie-ish with her huge cheeky grin that having an audience believe she's a sexually potent, rebellious bass player stretches credibility.
Not quite a bomb, but definitely not the bomb either.