![]() ![]() That might very well be true, but the problem becomes a matter of non-professional actors trying very hard to make dialogue sound authentic and naturalistic and mostly failing. Like a musical of sorts, Yakin has his performers break into intricately choreographed dance numbers throughout the film, and Smith tells us that all involved thought it would be easier for professional dancers to attempt to act than the other way around. It’s not particularly difficult to keep track of, thankfully, but the longer the film goes on, the more it feels like a gimmick than an actual attempt to grapple with the inherent contradictions inside each of us.Īll of these performers are dancers, not professional actors, a fact that Smith announces directly to the audience at the beginning of the film. Eden is predominantly played by Tyler Phillips, as well as Bobbi Jene Smith. Aviva is mostly portrayed by Zina Zinchenko, who occasionally cedes the screen to Or Schraiber. The kicker is that the characters of Eden and Aviva are each played by both a man and a woman, each of whom represents different aspects of their respective character’s personalities, and who all share the screen together. Aviva is largely familiar material, following the tumultuous relationship of sullen, depressed Eden and the more outwardly normal Aviva from the beginnings of their romance through an ill-advised marriage and the inevitable dissolution of that marriage. It’s the kind of bad film that can only come from a deeply personal place, and as such, it seems almost churlish to pan it, like insulting a friend who has sheepishly shared their terrible poetry with you. Unfortunately, the film is a cliched relationship drama obscured by so many bells and whistles, so much self-reflexive artistic intent, and so many grandiose pretensions, that it collapses under its own weight. After years of occasionally successful toil ( Remember the Titans was a sizable hit his last film, Boarding School, barely got released), Aviva is very much a conscious attempt to reclaim that independent spirit. Aviva has the distinct feel a Personal™ film, and one that mistakes gimmickry for depth at every turn.īoaz Yakin has had a bizarre career, a textbook case (or cautionary tale) of a young, independent director struggling to finance personal films while finding steady work in the Hollywood machine.
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