A surfeit of visual noodling and little effectively directed and written drama make up “All I See Is You,” a what-if gimmick posing as a dissection of a marriage where one spouse is blind, yet it’s the other half who’s the needy one.
A kind of anti-Nicholas Sparks movie, in which good intentions unintentionally expose cracks in a union, Marc Forster’s superficially trippy Thailand-set movie — peppered as it is with amorphous waves of shapes and colors meant to evoke the point of view of the sight-impaired — never plays like something that had to be made about the human condition. Think instead a short faux-experimental film unnecessarily stretched to the yawning point.
Blake Lively plays Gina, a woman rendered blind as a child after a car accident that killed her parents. She lives in Bangkok with her insurance-executive husband James (Jason Clarke) in an unassuming apartment, but it’s a good life. There’s the friendly exoticism of a foreign country, a comfortable physical intimacy they hope will one day bring a child into the world, and James’s attentiveness, which feels natural and helpful instead of oppressive.
But the promise of something better arises when Gina and James make an appointment to see a surgeon (Danny Huston), who reveals that an operation to restore sight in Gina’s right eye has a good chance of working. Buoyed by what could be, they go dancing at a club that night, but the first fissures start to show when James’s insecurities (“We look stupid”) harsh her buzz. Forcefully leading her out, Gina finds herself separated and alone in a crowded rush of revelers, and there’s the teensiest hint in the air that the brief abandonment was deliberate on James’s part.
When the operation proves successful, Gina discovers a textured world of people, places and objects that stoke a desire to assert herself more, and to jazz up her and James’s lives. No longer is their modest pad acceptable to her — she now wants a traditional Thai house in a picturesque village — nor the perceived drabness of her appearance, nor the couple’s unadventurous sex. On a trip to Spain to visit Gina’s sister Carla (Ahna O’Reilly, “Marshall”) and her macho, expressionistic-painter husband Ramon (Miquel Fernández) — a loudly coital couple who practically ooze naughtiness — James is further confronted by a sense of sexual inadequacy. (Being goaded into attending a live sex show doesn’t help.)
His sense of control ebbing by the minute, uptight James feels increasingly as if he won’t be enough for his less-dependent, awakened wife, and back home, when Gina dyes her hair blonde and dresses provocatively for a work event, James can’t help but openly express his discomfort, further driving a wedge between them.
Eventually things veer into domestic-thriller territory with the emergence of a handsome swim pal friend of Gina’s named Daniel (Wes Chatham, “The Hunger Games: Mockingjay”) and a medical left turn. But that veer arrives with an obviousness that sparks a mental checklist in your head of scenes and moments you know are coming. Predictability doesn’t always indicate lack of suspense — Hitchcock’s whole point in the oft-referenced example is that you know there’s a ticking bomb under the table — but Forster seems hamstrung by the sudden emergence of plot mechanics as a window into emotion, and distinctly uninterested in burrowing into the psychology of Gina’s and James’s changed dynamic as a firm basis from which to ratchet up the creepiness.
It leaves the movie rushing through its rudimentary melodrama, while Forster sticks to his diet of phantasmagoric visuals (courtesy cinematographer Matthias Koenigswieser, “After the Fall”) and choppily-edited scenes that he believes hold some impressionistic truth about relationships between men and women.
The shame is that interesting actors Lively and Clarke get the short end of the stick by having little more to do than wander around in an underwritten movie. (Forster is credited with the screenplay along with Sean Conway.) The stars are perfectly believable throughout — Lively’s shift from innocent to emboldened is commendable, and Clarke knows how to sell nervous, queasy energy — but servicing a thin scenario, not to mention fighting for screen time with Forster’s kaleidoscopic digressions, squanders the potential for something thornier. The movie’s ambitions are misguided, which makes it all too fuzzy of an experience.
The 17 Tackiest Cannes PR Stunts, From Blake Lively's Sharks to Sacha Baron Cohen's Mankini (Photos)
From a faux terrorist attack to sharks in the French Riviera, promoters often miss the mark with their gaudy Cannes PR stunts.
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Faux “Terror Raid” to Promote Oraxy Guests at Hotel du Cap Eden-Roc got a surprise visit by men outfitted in militia-themed gear last year, who approached the hotel by boat. It was a publicity stunt for the Paris-based Oraxy, which describes itself as “the world’s first private global marketplace reserved exclusively for UHNWI,” or Ultra High Net Worth Individuals.
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Sacha Baron Cohen Wears Green Mankini In 2006, Sacha Baron Cohen sported a bright green male thong known as the “mankini” to promote “Borat! Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan.”
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Sacha Baron Cohen Brings a Camel In 2012, “The Dictator” actor turned up with two model bodyguards and a camel. He even managed to fall off the camel, which bore a license plate with “Wadiya 1” on it – a reference to the fictional North African Republic of Wadiya, where “The Dictator” was set.
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T.J. Miller Parachutes in to Debut "Emoji Movie" Trailer To promote Sony’s “The Emoji Movie,” T.J. Miller parasailed into Cannes before unveiling a trailer for the film, in which he voices Gene, the Meh emoji. Emojis don't feel very Cannes.
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"The Shallows" Brings in Fake Sharks To promote Blake Lively's nautical horror film, Screen Gems planted fake sharks in the French Riviera.
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Faux Snow for "A Christmas Carol" Disney tapped Jim Carrey for a new version of “A Christmas Carol” in 2009 — and decided to bring the holiday spirit to Cannes by covering the Croisette with snow. Not the best example of reading the room or, in this case, the luxurious French beach town in the middle of May. Shout out to Robin Wright and Colin Firth in the background for looking horrified at the faux snowball fight.
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Jerry Seinfeld Flies In to Promote "Bee Movie" In 2007, Jerry Seinfeld took Cannes by air to promote his big animated push for Disney, for which he served as writer and star and recruited pals like Chris Rock. His giant bee costume might have been worse than his notorious “Seinfeld” puffy shirt.
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Angelina Jolie, Will Smith Ride Inflatable Shark Will Smith, Angelina Jolie and Jack Black rode a 14-foot inflatable shark to promote "Shark Tale" in 2004.
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"Trolls" Wigs Anna Kendrick and Justin Timberlake promoted "Trolls" in 2016 with an array of women wearing bright-colored outfits and wigs reminiscent of the costumes in the movie. Also, they're all in gowns -- a play on Cannes fashion?
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Gaspar Noe’s Graphic Makeout Posters to Promote “Love” Gaspar Noe at first shocked -- and then satisfied -- critics with his depiction of sex on film. He was praised for depicting the joyous and fervent act and staying mostly out of the realm of straight-up pornography. Promoting the film, however, was a different story. Producers wallpapered Cannes in posters of a saliva-covered triple kiss and an NSFW image of a penis and a woman's breast after climax.
Indiewire
Dolph Lundgren, Jean-Claude Van Damme Hold Impromptu Stage Fight Both "Universal Soldier" actors held a stage fight on the steps of a famed staircase in 1992. Many believed it was real, but Lundgren told The Hollywood Reporter that it was planned.
TriStar
Dead pigeons for "24 Hour Party People" In 2002, actors impersonating the band Happy Mondays mimicked a scene of the movie by throwing fake dead pigeons from the beach onto unsuspecting victims, who believed thousands of dead birds were falling from the sky, the BBC reported.
Film4
Naked Bike Rides Felix van Groeningen, the filmmaker behind “The Misfortunates,” decided to recreate a scene from his film where a dysfunctional family rides bikes in the nude. Just hours before a press conference, the director and his team disrobed and flew down the Croisette in the buff. A staffer on a motorcycle followed with their underwear, in case French police got a gander at them.
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The Cast of "The Expendables 3" Comes Out in Three Tanks
Producer Avi Lerner got three English World War II-era tanks into France to promote "The Expendables 3" in 2014. This wasn't all fun and games, as Lerner had to sign an affidavit to the government of France to ensure that his stunt wasn't interpreted as a declaration of war.
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Howard Stern and His "Private Parts"
Radio legend Howard Stern had a 40-foot inflated balloon of himself naked near the beach to promote his 1997 biopic "Private Parts." However, France's then-President Jaques Chirac was visiting Cannes and his security detail considered the balloon too crude to remain up. Though when Chirac left, Stern and his team reinflated it.
AP Photo/Lionel Cironneau
It's a Bird! It's a Plane!
To promote "Superman," Alexander Salkind--who was the film's supervisor--and Ilya, his son, hired prop planes to fly around the Croisette in 1975. In 1976, they got even more planes and in 1977, they hired a whole fleet of planes.
Warner Bros. Pictures/Photofest
Arnold Schwarzenegger's Muscle Pose
While promoting his bodybuilding-centered documentary film, "Pumping Iron," Arnold Schwarzenegger posed in a Speedo with a group of fully-clothed women to a beach audience.
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The glamorous festival has seen some crazy PR stunts over the years
From a faux terrorist attack to sharks in the French Riviera, promoters often miss the mark with their gaudy Cannes PR stunts.