A Cure for Wellness is the latest addition to Gore Verbinski's filmography and while it has more things wrong with it to count, it boasts enough visual style to keep the film's imagery as intriguing as possible. Telling the story of a young hot shot businessman named Lockheart (Dane DeHaan) as he must go to Switzerland to locate a missing business associate which leads him to find an institution that appears to force sicknesses on its patients. The film's cast includes DeHaan, Jason Isaac and Mia Goth, all of which do their best with what they have. On paper, this film seems like an amazing mystery thriller that cannot be missed. The reality is this is a ridiculously overwritten, overlong, and idiotic film that could have been so much more.
First and foremost, Verbinski's script is incredibly bloated and really doesn't have a pace to it. It moseys along like a lug and lands with a heavy handed thud. Personally, the film felt as if it was trying to emulate films like Shutter Island and Gothika. Instead, it feels like an unoriginal mix of those films and it really becomes annoying especially when the film could have easily been a great film at 90-100 minutes. The fact is, at almost 2 hours and 30 minutes, the film feels like a four epic that HBO should have made. It never reaches its full potential and leaves interesting points throughout the story on the table in the same hasty fashion they were introduced. The biggest issues that I think many people will have with the film are the runtime and the illogical and weak script. The more positive portions of the film are certainly its cinematography and its cast. The cinematography by Bojan Bazelli solidifies a certain and very interesting take on the material that plays into the tension the film wants you to feel. Even if the story doesn't get that feeling across, at least the images do.
Overall, A Cure for Wellness leaves much to be desired. Despite a more than able cast and beautiful cinematography, the film just can't hit a stride. The hard truth is that it is a boring movie that is poorly written and ends up making you feel more annoyed than anything. While the images and cast may be attractive, there are simply too many issues with the film to recommend.
First and foremost, Verbinski's script is incredibly bloated and really doesn't have a pace to it. It moseys along like a lug and lands with a heavy handed thud. Personally, the film felt as if it was trying to emulate films like Shutter Island and Gothika. Instead, it feels like an unoriginal mix of those films and it really becomes annoying especially when the film could have easily been a great film at 90-100 minutes. The fact is, at almost 2 hours and 30 minutes, the film feels like a four epic that HBO should have made. It never reaches its full potential and leaves interesting points throughout the story on the table in the same hasty fashion they were introduced. The biggest issues that I think many people will have with the film are the runtime and the illogical and weak script. The more positive portions of the film are certainly its cinematography and its cast. The cinematography by Bojan Bazelli solidifies a certain and very interesting take on the material that plays into the tension the film wants you to feel. Even if the story doesn't get that feeling across, at least the images do.
Overall, A Cure for Wellness leaves much to be desired. Despite a more than able cast and beautiful cinematography, the film just can't hit a stride. The hard truth is that it is a boring movie that is poorly written and ends up making you feel more annoyed than anything. While the images and cast may be attractive, there are simply too many issues with the film to recommend.