Review: "Atlas Shrugged Part 2"

Atlas Shrugged Part 2 was significantly improved over Part 1. Better editing, cinematography, pacing, dialogue - many of my complaints about Part 1 were addressed, which shows they were listening to the fans.
Firstly, they stuck closer to the source material and largely stuck to rearranging Rand's dialogue for flow rather than tying to water it down or rewrite it. You actually hear Ayn Rand's wisdom coming through much clearer this time. One big thing they inserted was D'Anconia's Money speech (albeit edited), which was a gigantic missing piece of Part 1. I'm glad they remembered it this time!

I love what they did with the tunnel scene - it was one of the climatic moments of the book and they did an excellent job capturing the spirit and momentum of the scene when adapting it to film. In the book, it's paced tensely with the lack of responsibility being bumped up the chain and the tension of what to do mounting steadily to end in disaster. Here, they switch more to a visual form, letting you see the mounting crises on the railroad maps and such. It was different from the book, but precisely how it needed to be done to make it work in a film.

The new Francisco D'Anconia was a good choice and Robert Picardo as Dr. Stadtler was great (that's actually who I pictured as the character when I was reading it). I'm not fond of the new Hank Rearden or Lillian Rearden - I prefer the Part 1 actors, but that's a minor dislike.The new Dagny is fine, as is the new Eddie. The James Taggart they picked emphases a different aspect of the character: his showy bravado that masks his lack of confidence and fundamental hatred for competent people. He's less of an outward wimp like the Part 1 version, but it's not a bad change.

They did a good job inserting modern day parallels into the story, such as raising gas prices, both the Tea Party and Occupy Movement, and other little touches here and there largely missing from Part 1. You get a better sense that this is the near future.

Things they still need to improve:

1. 20th Century Motor Company - They keep explaining what happened in a very short and clipped way that just ruins the impact of that story. I really wish they'd just save the backstory for a narrative dump.

2. Flashbacks - They really need to use these. The backstory of Francisco and Dagny, Rearden's childhood, 20th Century, etc. would all be suited for flashbacks. It lets them show rather than tell.

3. Richard Halley - So we got Halley in Part 2 - for all of 5 minutes. They really dropped the ball on this, since music as a thematic element is much easier to do in a movie than a book.

4. Dagny on a Train - In the book, Dagny rides the train a lot. So far, we've had a grand total of ONE TIME where we've seen her on a train in these movies. It doesn't help the train symbolism when you have your train riding protagonist in a car most of the time.

5. Rising Tide of Mediocrity - We get a better taste of "the world is collapsing because only the incompetent are left" in Part 2, but they're leaving out a lot of scenes that in the book helped establish this early on. For example, Chapter 1 had a great scene where Dagny is disgusted by the sloth of her own railway workers who don't want to fix the problem so they don't get in trouble. Dodging responsibility is one of the key systems failures Ayn Rand was pointing out as a flaw of a collectivist system and did so largely through dialogue. Since those scenes would only add maybe 5-10 minutes to the film, they really shouldn't be left out as much.

6. Over Emphasis - On the flipside, there are several overwrought moments where the music and dramatic pauses cross into narm territory. It's good they're taking their time in Part 2 to stress things, but they need to back away from that a little. Increasing the number of minor exchanges (as described above) that reiterate the theme without a need to dramatize makes the point better.

My criticisms are less on the technical side this time and more on the interpretation and higher order film making. They finally have the basics down, now they need to refine it. I'm genuinely looking forward to Part 3 now and I hope they do an even better job with it.