Thor, you have truly lost it. Really. Added to your fleet of turned-backs...
No, I think you need to reevaluate your fandom. You say you're a De Palma fan, and you can't recognize the qualities in PASSION. That's disturbing.
You can't be serious. I'm a Hitchcock fan - no bigger Hitch fan than I - does that make me LOVE and defend every film he made? No. I can't defend Under Capricorn or Jamaica Inn and neither can he, as a matter of fact. He doesn't need to reevaluate anything. He has an opinion, just like you. You LOVE self-referential, self-aware over-the-top "noir tropes" (thanks for the cliche). I like a good story well done is what I like and De Palma has made a few of those, Passion not being one of them.
Being a De Palma fan means occasionally shoving story and credibility out the window, and just marvel at how he stages the story elements (a bit of Hitchcock here, a bit of Argento there etc.); lots of slo-mo, one-takes, lush colours. All of that is in PASSION, and it remains a mystery to me how you're not able to see that. In my opinion, you're not a proper De Palma fan if you can't recognize these qualities in this film (regardless of how you evaluate it).
Yup, me as well. Even if the story (it looks like a Snake Eyes-like conspiracy plot from the trailer) is no great shakes, I always like to see how De Palma stages the action and suspense.
Being a De Palma fan means occasionally shoving story and credibility out the window, and just marvel at how he stages the story elements (a bit of Hitchcock here, a bit of Argento there etc.); lots of slo-mo, one-takes, lush colours. All of that is in PASSION, and it remains a mystery to me how you're not able to see that. In my opinion, you're not a proper De Palma fan if you can't recognize these qualities in this film (regardless of how you evaluate it).
So, you are the arbiter of what it means to be a De Palma fan? O-kay.
Thor has a point, I think DePalma is usually better considered here in Europe
but I take the "goofy"? THE FURY over trashy tv-movie looking (fuck Almodovar's DP) with a nice twisted set-piece (the fake split screen) PASSION any day
usual editor Bill Pankow is credited in DOMINO.... so we'll see about the cut... 148 sounded too long anyway for DePalma (except SCARFACE)
Yes, for many years, after his 'more successful times', his latter films would always get released in some European cinemas, especially France, when they were starting to bypass cinemas in the USA and UK. WISEGUYS was the first film, I recall, that bypassed a cinema viewing in the UK, but normal service was resumed with his more successful films after that, until FEMME FATALE. I think his last film that got a UK cinema release was BLACK DAHLIA.
Just one last thing about PASSION that I forgot in my shock after the negative remarks here:
We covered the film extensively and enthusiastically when it was released. Here's an article we did, assembling some critics' feedbacks (the text is in Norwegian, but the review excerpts are all in English -- including De Palma's own words -- so you can scroll to the text in italic):
I don't know any of his short early films or his own documentary - that stuff don't interest me much, but his big cinema sure did there's no denying he's one of the best the last 40 years. Most of his films have great characteristics there riveting there exciting some even knife-edge that keeps me interested more than most, i haven't seen Domino but I'm sure its another good effort.
