The Lost City Of Z [Blu-ray]

DVD Wholesale Quick Overview:

I’m not sure what’s going on with all the poor reviews, labeling this movie boring, but I wholeheartedly disagree. Not a single aspect felt forced or choppy, either. It was exactly what I was expecting from a movie on Percy Fawcett and from a director of this caliber. All the actors were a credit to their roles as well. Charlie Hunnam managed to wow me once again with his subtlety of expressions that lend a certain ferocity, even artistry, I haven’t seen in an up and coming actor in a long time.

If the story of Percy Fawcett interests you or if you’re a fan of Charlie Hunnam as I have become, then don’t pay attention to the bad reviews. Check it out for yourself, because that’s what I did and I wasn’t disappointed at all.- Scorpio21

This was a good movie, but uneven. It is about real-life British army officer/explorer Percy Fawcett seeking medals for his uniform and making up for the disgrace of his father. He gets assigned to map the border between Boliva and Brazil. But after seeing how the natives are treated, finding some (old?) pieces of pottery deep in the Amazon jungle, and hearing tales of a lost city, finding the city turns into an obsession for him.

For a movie about exploring the Amazon trying to find a lost city, it has precious little jungle hardships and precious little ancient ruins or artifacts. While he is a mostly likable character the movie really seems to be about Fawcett’s personal, Royal Geographic Society, and military problems more than anything. It also has a social justice/class theme that seems a bit heavy-handed. Maybe Fawcett really was ahead of his time in that thinking, and his wife really did feel repressed by society, or maybe it was just put into the movie to please modern audiences?

The plot moves in fits and starts, one moment Fawcett is deep in the jungle and next he is back in England. Or they get attacked by natives and suddenly the scene is over, there is no discussion about defending themselves better or how often it happened. The movie skips hours, days, weeks, or years at will. This happens multiple times, the movie already seems long at 2.5 hours but it still should flow more logically or at least have some sort of explanation/narration between the time gaps.

The ending is not great but given the real-life story, it is understandable.

-D. Bateman

Robert Pattinson’s supporting performance as Mr. Costin is the crown jewel in this biopic about Percy Fawcett that centers around his expeditions into the South American rainforest. If you are not familiar with that part of history don’t read up on it until after watching the film.

Charlie Hunnam as Percy is passable, and he did a better job with the role than I expected. Though his vocal inflections were improved he still often carried himself like and furrowed his brow in the same way as his Sons of Anarchy character Jax Teller. The performance is also more subtle than what I had seen from him in Crimson Peak and I appreciated that about it.

It is the relationship between these two characters and their journey over the years that carries the movie in my opinion. While there are plenty others that play their part and well enough to keep the viewer interested — it is how the two characters of Fawcett & Costin play off each other that keeps the pacing of the movie tight.

The Amazon and its people are vibrantly and respectfully represented from what I can tell. Few action sequences exist within the movie but are really quite well shot with great thrill and uncertainty for the outcome. I feel like the expedition itself was put to film in fairly genuine fashion without getting bogged down in details that would derail entertainment value.

It’s all of this that makes the final act of the movie fail miserably for me. We spend so much of the film focusing on the trials of Fawcett and Costin for it to then lose its way in the last give or take thirty minutes. It rushes through tying every thread up to match with reality and the history lesson hidden within the drama.

Watch this movie for the sequences in the Amazon with the indigenous people and a truly transcendent performance by Robert Pattinson — we had to double check it even was him at first and continued in awe after knowing so. Most of this movie is good to great. It’s a shame I found the structure of the final act to be so poorly executed comparatively.

-Trevor Elms

DVD Wholesale Main Features:

Actors: Charlie Hunnam, Tom Holland, Robert Pattinson, Sienna Miller
Directors: James Gray
Format: Subtitled, Widescreen
Language: Spanish
Subtitles: English, Spanish
Subtitles for the Hearing Impaired: English
Region: Region A/1
Number of discs: 1
Rated: PG-13 Parents Strongly Cautioned
Studio: Broad Green Pictures
DVD Release Date: July 11, 2017
Run Time: 141 minutes
ASIN: B071YLQH65