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Amazon.co.uk Review
Director and screenwriter Mark Romanek, previously best known for his Nine Inch Nails and Madonna music videos, has made a stylish, distinctive entry into the world of mainstream movies; the film combines an ever-intensifying sense of menace with some unconventional shocks that never descend into clichés. Refreshingly, the film is presented from Parrish's point of view rather than the Yorkins', and it's a real (if disquieting) treat to see Williams ditch his usual bumbling buffoon character and get another meaty role to sink his teeth into. Eschewing the formulas and devices of the standard thriller with bleak effectiveness, One Hour Photo is a far more intelligent proposition than most of its peers--though it may be a disappointment to those expecting visceral thrills.
On the DVD: One Hour Photo's beautifully austere photography and skilful use of colour translates excellently to the DVD's anamorphic widescreen format. The stylish menu screens have a photo-processing theme with stills and film footage; the extras comprise an informative and often amusing commentary from Romanek and Williams, a 25-minute Sundance Channel "Anatomy of a Scene" feature, a 12-minute Cinemax featurette, and an in-depth and entertaining half-hour interview with director and star from New York's acclaimed Charlie Rose show. The film is presented in Dolby Digital 5.1 and both movie and commentary are subtitled in English only. --Rikki Price
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18 of 19 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
One of the most impressive intellectual thrillers in years,
By Daniel Jolley "darkgenius" (Shelby, North Carolina USA) - See all my reviews (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER) (TOP 100 REVIEWER) (REAL NAME)
This review is from: One Hour Photo [DVD] [2002] (DVD)
Robin Williams gives an Oscar-worthy performance as the lonely, somewhat creepy, but wholly sympathetic Sy Parrish in this haunting, compelling directorial debut by Mark Romanek. Some have called this a scary movie, but One Hour Photo works on emotional levels much deeper than fear and disquiet. This is an intellectual thriller that at times borders on a work of art, a carefully constructed exploration of the depths to which loneliness and bland ordinariness can drive a man. Everyone reacts to this movie differently; by design, a sense of moral ambiguity pervades the story and its presentation. Many may see Sy Parrish as a bad guy (though certainly not a stereotypical one); those lucky enough to never know the hopelessness and loneliness this man endures or to experience the devastation of seeing your whole world pulled out from under your feet may look down their noses at him with denigration, not truly understanding his afflictions. Most of us, though, know what utter loneliness feels like to some degree, and I can't help but believe that most viewers will feel a connection to Sy Parrish that differs markedly from what they might anticipate going in. If you ask me, there is a bad guy in this film, but it is not Sy Parrish.Sy Parrish's job means everything to him; as a photo developer at a large retail store, he develops customers' pictures with great care and professionalism. Outside of his photo development domain, he is bland and invisible, a man truly alone. His life could not be more different from the lives he sees day by day in the pictures he develops - in the pictures of happy families, he sees everything he wants but cannot have. Thus, it almost seems natural that he would begin to fantasize about being a part of such a life, to have a family of his own. His favorite family is the Yorkins, a seemingly perfect young couple with one son. Nina Yorkin (Connie Nielsen) is one of Sy's best customers; she's always bringing in pictures to be developed. Having watched the Yorkin family evolve over a number of years, Sy has adopted them as his own, making his own copies of all their pictures. He knows Nina, her husband Will (Michael Vartan), and son Jake (Dylan Smith) intimately through their photos; he knows where they live, what their house is like, and all sorts of additional personal details about them. In his own mind, he is Uncle Sy to Jake, and he tries to insinuate himself into the Yorkins' lives at just the time his own real life is beginning to fragment. His job is no longer secure, and it is during this troubled time that he discovers that the Yorkins are not the ideal family after all. That discovery is just more than he can take. This is not the kind of role you associate with Robin Williams, but there can be no doubt that this man is among the most accomplished of actors. All of the natural energy Williams suppresses in his transformation to the externally calm, quiet, rather forgettable Sy Parrish lends his performance a power that few other actors could bring to such a role. Writer and director Mark Romanek gave Williams a completely different look, and the set design and cinematography reinforces that directorial vision to lend the movie a sense of hyperreality that proves as unsettling as Sy's descent into mental disconnection. The acting is superb all the way around, but Williams clearly steals the show with one of the most impressive performances I've seen in a long time. Topped off by a writer/director/actor commentary, a really well-made behind-the-scenes featurette, an "Anatomy of a Scene" Sundance Channel Featurette, and an extensive interview with Robin Williams and Mark Romanek on The Charlie Rose Show, One Hour Photo easily qualifies as a must-own DVD.
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Subtly disturbing....,
By
This review is from: One Hour Photo [DVD] [2002] (DVD)
The genius in this film lies perhaps in what it isn't. It isn't gratuitous, it isn't predictable and it isn't scary. It does, however, really get under your skin. Robin Williams excels as Sy Parrish, a lonely, delusional photolab technician who becomes obsessed with a family for whom he has been developing photographs for many years. Sy has nothing and no one to go home to, and only his contact with the apparently idyllic lives of the Yorkin family protects him from the realisation of his total lonliness.
There's no dimly lit horror scenes here, only bleak, bright white and sterile environments which help to portray the precise, yet barren territory of Sy's mind. Something happened with this film which made it greater than the sum of its parts, and in my mind it's one of the most disturbing films I've seen, purely because of the lasting effect it has. I feel that somewhere, Sy is still living in his fantasy of the perfect family....
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Williams is Outstanding in a Great Looking Movie,
By
This review is from: One Hour Photo [DVD] [2002] (DVD)
One Hour Photo is a film about a lonely man who develops film at "SavMart". His name is Sy Parrish (Robin Williams) and his job is really all he has. There are social ingredients missing in Sy's mind, and as we get to closer to him we begin to put the pieces together. He has nothing to live for outside of his job and the family that are his favorite customers. The Yorkins; Nina (Connie Nielsen), Will (Michael Vartan), and their only child Jake are the customers Sy most enjoys producing prints for. He sees them as the ideal family and he loves them so much that he creates copies of their prints for himself and he calls himself "uncle" Sy. Unfortunately for Sy, the Yorkins are not aware of any of this. Sy is awkward and socially inept. He walks through life without the ability to relate appropriately with others and it begins to weigh in on him. So what happens if Will Yorkin's friend Maya shows up with a roll of film of her own, and the pictures show her being intimate with Will? What will Uncle Sy do?
There is a genuine creepiness to Director Mark Romanek's One Hour Photo. Romanek's ability to organize images to appropriately translate in the music video medium is evidently a solid carryover to his work as a feature filmmaker. This movie has a remarkably unique feel to it and where most films of this genre would focus on the Yorkins as the protagonists, One Hour Photo has us staring directly at the empty and profoundly sad Sy Parrish. Jeff Cronenweth, the film's cinematographer, also deserves immense praise for his blinding white SavMart shots and overall crisp photography. The setting becomes Sy's element effortlessly, which is convenient because SavMart is Sy. He has nothing to go home to. The most praise though should land squarely upon Robin Williams. His role is a completely unrecognizable transformation and even though he received praise and a Saturn Award, he may have received more if this performance was in a different genre. There is something about the way One Hour Photo unfolds that is appropriate but invariably predictable. The ending doesn't hit as hard as the effective (and credit-less) opening scenes. It's hard to say whether that is a criticism of the second half of One Hour Photo or a gigantic compliment to the first half. I can't imagine a better ending that wouldn't come off as overly contrived or too psychological but all of this is very much just nitpicking. One Hour Photo is a very good movie carried primarily by its lead performance and its original atmosphere.
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