Sunday 12 June 2011

The Traveler

What is going on with this movie?  The last time I asked that question, it was in reference to the layered meaning in Harpoon: Whale Watching Massacre.  This time I'm asking about the two-faced approach to storytelling in The Traveler.

On Christmas Eve, Val Kilmer walks into a police station with a murder confession on his lips.  The cops process him and discover, too late, they're caught in a supernatural vengeance plot, while you, the viewer, have the strangest feeling that you've seen something like this before.

The Traveler has all kinds of problems.  I could use this space to write up a laundry list of the inconsistencies, logic errors, and bad of dialogue that are featured in the movie, but I've decided instead to use my powers of criticism and analysis for lesser evil and produced this handy after-the-fact guide to screenwriting:

Click to biggen.

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