melodramatic

He’s double-cast Luna and Tonatiuh as the film-within-a-film’s leads and changed the imaginary tale from a Nazi propaganda flick to a melodramatic but moving South American romance between a glamour queen and a noble photographer.

The material could easily have tilted into melodramatic TV territory, but Redford handled it with a steady, unshowy touch, letting pain seep through pauses, glances and the things left unsaid.

But in screenwriter Noah Pink’s melodramatic imagining of incidents both well-documented and mysterious, one can see this Hollywood veteran on a mission to loosen the shackles of his reputation and have some nasty, brutish fun.

Even the sleepiest off-season Sunday can suddenly erupt into the latest melodramatic controversy, with rumours, counter-rumours and abrupt U-turns a matter of course.

The cinematography tries too hard to capture melodramatic modern police procedurals with their choking clouds of haze.