...even if it's obvious than most of the voting on this site so far is likely from the cast and crew (80% give it a 10? Rather suspicious...), and that it features only two actors of any renown: esteemed and recently-departed Canadian character actor, Maury "Dances With Wolves" Chaykin, and Simon "Saw IV" Reynolds. Still, tyro auteur Kent Tessman--writer/director/producer/editor/score--whose only prior credit is a made-for-TV movie some years back, has put together a decent, if somewhat slow-paced bit of modern noir that has much to recommend it, though not to the typical IMDber.
Briefly: a schlub stockbroker of some type or another (Craig "Royal Canadian Air Farce" Lauzon) gets drawn into shady dealings by his boss (Reynolds) having to do with transfers of presumably money from one suspicious character to another. Meanwhile, the schlub gets into a relationship (that unfortunately never really convinces) with the boss' pretty secretary (Lindsey Deluce) and after said boss finally ends up dead, the two are apparently going to "run for the border" or some such. A pair of cops dog the schlub's moves, and a few bad guys, including Chaykin as some sort of wealthy something-or-other, make veiled threats. For a lo-fi affair, the production values are quite good: good camera-jockeying by Tim "I mostly do shorts" Dashwood, nice design, sets, costumes, locations, etc. etc. etc.; all in all, definitely on a par with far pricier Hollywood productions. Major props for all that. The leads are actually quite good, and deserve to have healthy careers, and the supports are decent as well. I agree with an off-site reviewer that things could have been tightened up a bit to give the story more tension; the pace of storytelling was a bit too slow for my liking, though it fit the character as written. Maybe it's just that he was a bit *too much* of a schlub, a little too naive and faux-innocent to be believable. Ms. Deluce was quite charming, and I'm sorry to see she apparently hasn't been getting any work, or has perhaps left the business. The ending of the film is just a tad too vague to be satisfying as well; I really wasn't quite sure what happened, to be honest. Despite its many positive qualities, I'm not surprised that "Bull" got no theatrical distribution, and took three years to get to video. It was just a little too soporific for its own good, and likely left many in its so far limited audience repeating the title as the film ended.
Features one gorgeous naked woman, one tidy suicide, no action to speak of, but appealing characters that otherwise needed just a bit more fleshing out to fully engage the viewer. I hope to see more work from Mr. Tessman and his crew in the future, for what that's worth. Glad I found it at the library; I'd have regretted spending any significant money on it, sorry to say.
Briefly: a schlub stockbroker of some type or another (Craig "Royal Canadian Air Farce" Lauzon) gets drawn into shady dealings by his boss (Reynolds) having to do with transfers of presumably money from one suspicious character to another. Meanwhile, the schlub gets into a relationship (that unfortunately never really convinces) with the boss' pretty secretary (Lindsey Deluce) and after said boss finally ends up dead, the two are apparently going to "run for the border" or some such. A pair of cops dog the schlub's moves, and a few bad guys, including Chaykin as some sort of wealthy something-or-other, make veiled threats. For a lo-fi affair, the production values are quite good: good camera-jockeying by Tim "I mostly do shorts" Dashwood, nice design, sets, costumes, locations, etc. etc. etc.; all in all, definitely on a par with far pricier Hollywood productions. Major props for all that. The leads are actually quite good, and deserve to have healthy careers, and the supports are decent as well. I agree with an off-site reviewer that things could have been tightened up a bit to give the story more tension; the pace of storytelling was a bit too slow for my liking, though it fit the character as written. Maybe it's just that he was a bit *too much* of a schlub, a little too naive and faux-innocent to be believable. Ms. Deluce was quite charming, and I'm sorry to see she apparently hasn't been getting any work, or has perhaps left the business. The ending of the film is just a tad too vague to be satisfying as well; I really wasn't quite sure what happened, to be honest. Despite its many positive qualities, I'm not surprised that "Bull" got no theatrical distribution, and took three years to get to video. It was just a little too soporific for its own good, and likely left many in its so far limited audience repeating the title as the film ended.
Features one gorgeous naked woman, one tidy suicide, no action to speak of, but appealing characters that otherwise needed just a bit more fleshing out to fully engage the viewer. I hope to see more work from Mr. Tessman and his crew in the future, for what that's worth. Glad I found it at the library; I'd have regretted spending any significant money on it, sorry to say.
