Spoilers.
The content of my remarks was primed by reading reviews only after going into the film blind. I was shocked to see how superficial some of the reads (by prominent names) were-as though I had seen a different film entirely. So much dwelling on the main character's wealth and how that wealth has made him into a dick. It's confusing. In the film I watched, one finds out what's going on bit by bit. And it is not a movie about a spoiled callous guy even though it starts out with the man's family incredulous at the disregard he displays by staying in Mexico on vacation and dodging his mother's funeral.
Why would anyone who knows somebody well be so upset and unsettled and confused by a normal pattern of jerk-like behavior? That is a clue that what we are watching is something other than it appears on the very surface.
At the start of this vacation, he is "known" by only one other man: his family lawyer. The vacation is his last hurrah, communing with his nephew, niece and sister who are unaware that he has metastatic cancer. He himself is unaware of the new tumor growing in his frontal lobe and accounting for behavior that may diverge from his norm and eventually, full-on hallucinations related to the family business which is large scale slaughtering of swine.
One reporter mentioned the film became surreal at the end. It was not surreal. It showed the I'll man we've been watching the whole time see things that are not there. Literally. Sundown even refers, in some places, to late/end stage brain cancer. Also used to describe other dementias from other diseases.
What is clear is only that the core of the man is private and wants to die independently. Not unlike how a pet wanders off at the end. He avoids situations like: chemo. And funerals. And talking about it. He wants to drink, make love with a girl, sit in the sun, swim in the ocean. It's only his reduced capacity that leaves him vulnerable to people who are desperate for money.
I have never, ever seen Tim Roth better than in this film. He hardly speaks. I don't really have the skill to comment on how nuanced these performances were...again-it's haunting me today. A slow burn. And devastating.
The content of my remarks was primed by reading reviews only after going into the film blind. I was shocked to see how superficial some of the reads (by prominent names) were-as though I had seen a different film entirely. So much dwelling on the main character's wealth and how that wealth has made him into a dick. It's confusing. In the film I watched, one finds out what's going on bit by bit. And it is not a movie about a spoiled callous guy even though it starts out with the man's family incredulous at the disregard he displays by staying in Mexico on vacation and dodging his mother's funeral.
Why would anyone who knows somebody well be so upset and unsettled and confused by a normal pattern of jerk-like behavior? That is a clue that what we are watching is something other than it appears on the very surface.
At the start of this vacation, he is "known" by only one other man: his family lawyer. The vacation is his last hurrah, communing with his nephew, niece and sister who are unaware that he has metastatic cancer. He himself is unaware of the new tumor growing in his frontal lobe and accounting for behavior that may diverge from his norm and eventually, full-on hallucinations related to the family business which is large scale slaughtering of swine.
One reporter mentioned the film became surreal at the end. It was not surreal. It showed the I'll man we've been watching the whole time see things that are not there. Literally. Sundown even refers, in some places, to late/end stage brain cancer. Also used to describe other dementias from other diseases.
What is clear is only that the core of the man is private and wants to die independently. Not unlike how a pet wanders off at the end. He avoids situations like: chemo. And funerals. And talking about it. He wants to drink, make love with a girl, sit in the sun, swim in the ocean. It's only his reduced capacity that leaves him vulnerable to people who are desperate for money.
I have never, ever seen Tim Roth better than in this film. He hardly speaks. I don't really have the skill to comment on how nuanced these performances were...again-it's haunting me today. A slow burn. And devastating.