Gold

The world in the near future is in trouble. A man (Zac Efron) rides the rails like a hobo. He gets driven to a job at the gold dig site. Along the way, they stumble upon a giant gold rock, but they are unable to dig it out with their limited tools. The man is left guarding the rock as the driver heads off for some heavy equipment.

Zac is going solo for long segments of this movie. In a way, it's his Cast Away. He does a fine job as his character deteriorates. A few plot points do bug me. When he is left alone initially, I felt something is off with the plan. The Stranger felt too aggressive. I almost assumed that she's a hallucination. I don't know why he's so protective of her body. Let the dogs have it. Finally, there is the arrow. I would rather not have the arrow. It's more sweetly dark to let the man have his reward. All in all, this is a fine effort from Zac and it's an interesting little indie.

However, despite the excellent effort and story ,it, in my mind was unsatisfying.

The bleak decolourised washed out look is a bit of a cliche these days and made it visually bland, especially in the kind of landscapes it was filmed in. That was the intention I suppose, but The Good , the Bad and the Ugly desert scenes ( in colour) were far more effective in conveying mood and intensity.

Not a commercial movie and might only appeal to males, solitary, alienated desert freaks.

Just an opinion.

After watching the new and utterly disappointing Matrix and Resident Evil films, I was beginning to lose hope in the movie industry, when this movie came along and proved to me that there are still excellent directors out there who can take a simple idea and turn it into "gold". (pun intended)

I enjoyed this movie from start to finish. I have always liked survival movies, especially the ones which involve trying to survive in the desert. The movie does an excellent job by not providing any sort of back story. You have no idea where the main character is headed and why (he refers to his destination vagely as the compound), or what's going on in the world for that matter. It makes you think of a post apocalyptic world, a Mad Max kind of world, but never gives you any clear hint as to what's really going on. While a bit weird, that's completely ok with me, because it helps you focus on the main plot; i.e. Trying to survive in the desert, which was absolutely enjoyable.

The shots were all beautifully taken and the accompanying music added to the mood. The ending came as a big surprise. The only real complaint I have is that it ended abruptly, but I totally get why they did it; because they were focused on making a moral point, and you can't help but think about that moral point the entire time the movie is playing, because it's so in your face.

If you enjoy survival movies with the desert as their setting, you're in for a hell of a ride, but if you don't like such slow-paced movies, you're going to find this movie excruciatingly slow and boring, so know your likes and dislikes before watching this movie so as not to waste your time or crtiticize such an excellent movie unfairy just because you didn't know what you were going into and were not familiar with your likes and dislikes.

If you're looking for action, horror, romance, science-fiction or a fast-paced movie, look elsewhere, because that's not what you're going to get from this movie.

I hope you're not giving me thumbs down just because I immensely enjoyed this movie, because I clearly told you about what this movie entails, and hopefully, now you can make up your mind.

The acting and directing is top notch. Zac Efron holds the entire movie. You really believe what he's going through. The movie has sufficient twists and turns and event a twist in the end. Overall I didn't feel very satisfied with the ending and wanted more. I felt like "what was the point" after going through this whole ordeal with the main character.

Zac Efron hasn't been in much lately. I suspect he's probably just working on other projects and doing other things with his time. But 'Gold' was not the type of film I expected him to come back with. At least it looked kind of interesting so I was excited to check it out. Here are my thoughts.

The film starts out very slowly. There are only two characters and neither of them are very interesting. At this point I was worried this could be a very slow and dull film. Then it gets to the plot though and things start to become a little more interesting.

The thing that bugged me most about the film was that it made no sense. Efron's character stays to guard the gold, however no one has ever found it before now. So why are they worried someone will miraculously find it in the next 5 days in the absolute middle of nowhere? I had trouble getting past that plot-point.

A large portion of the movie is just Efron's character by himself trying to survive. For a film to get away with this you have to be impeccable, otherwise you will lose your audience fast. 'Castaway' was strong enough to pull it off (just) - and even then it took a volleyball to carry it through. 'Gold' isn't quite as strong. The middle of this film can get a little tedious.

The make-up used on Efron's face was very well done. It didn't seem particularly consistent (I could be wrong on that but it felt like every time we cut to a new scene he looked different to the last), but it did look very painful and quite realistic.

The ending of the film is a bit of fun. I like it when films aren't afraid to do something a bit different in terms of concluding their film.

This is a very somber film. There are exactly zero laughs attempted. It doesn't take away from the film, but it is worth noting. 'Gold' isn't a film I will watch again. It had its moments and was mildly enjoyable at times but probably not one I would go out of my way to recommend. 6/10.