The Advocate (2013)

One of my all time favorites.

I think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.

It is an exhilarating, distressing, funny and profound film, with one of the more memorable film scores in years,

By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

This film was pretty bad - didn't feel like a "thriller" at all to me. The costume & scenery was great for a low budget Indy and the acting very good too, but the script stinks. By the end, I barely remembered the crime and didn't really care who did it, I just wanted this blather to end. The extreme amount of nudity and sex scenes is gratuitous borderline porn. By porn standards (and lack thereof), this would be a great film. For a mainstream flick, it is severely lacking in plot. Half way into the movie, I still really wasn't sure what the main story-line was supposed to be -- just a lot of nude scenes with some other court scenes sprinkled in (presumably to explain why everyone put their clothes back on only to later quickly take them off again). A Very disappointing flick.

The story had potential, but that potential was knifed, shot and strangled to death almost as soon as it started, and was certainly dead by the time the credits rolled.The acting in particular, especially by the lead, was SO bad, I could hardly stand to keep watching. It was like every word out of his mouth was being read for the first time off a cue card, after spending his entire life in over-enunciation school. It was as far from natural and believable as any dialogue I've ever heard in a movie, and kept me from being able to stay engaged in the story. With every word, I was ripped from a suspension of disbelief and slapped in the face again and again with the fact of completely contrived it was.And that stilted dialogue doomed the script itself to coming off as completely contrived as well.The over-enthusiastic review with all the stars just has to be by someone who was involved in this horrible production. "Bad taste" just doesn't even come close to covering it as a reason.My advice is to skip this dog, and go see a high school play instead, which would be much more entertaining.

Is Allyson Dougherty guilty or not? It's a simple question at the heart of The Advocate. But the bigger question is what will her attorney Ray Shekar do once he finds out the truth. And how far will he go to find the truth? The Advocate poses an interesting moral question: Can there be absolute justice? It answers it in a thrilling and thought provoking way.My rating of nine comes in the context of its budget. Having seen so many of these low budget thrillers over the years, this ambitious movie stands tall. Not only is the story compelling, it looks great, with an amazing score and incredible pacing. By no means is it perfect, but one can't really compare low budget films with big budget studio fare. A really interesting part of the story here is that these are first time filmmakers with limited resources. What they produced was amazing, and I can't wait to see what they do next.

I saw this film at a Film Festival at the Chinese Theater in Hollywood.Originality is rare commodity in film these days. It seems like everything has already been done. But this film has some ORIGINAL twists & turns. It's not predictable. That's because of the writing.And the old-fashioned Court Room Drama is a lost art. It's nice to see a film without explosions from time to time.The acting is believable.This is a smart movie. It's well-crafted and definitely worth seeing.