Cocaine Bear

Director: Elizabeth Banks
Starring: Keri Russell, Alden Ehrenreich, O'Shea Jackson Jr., Ray Liotta, Isiah Whitlock Jr., Brooklynn Prince, Christian Convery, Margo Martindale, Jesse Tyler Ferguson, Kristofer Hivju, Hannah Hoekstra, Ayoola Smart, J.B. Moore, Scott Seiss, Matthew Rhys
Running Time: 95 min.
Rating: R

★★★ (out of ★★★★) 

Labeling Elizabeth Banks' horror comedy Cocaine Bear as "based on a true story" probably stretches things a bit, but it's at least loosely inspired by one. In 1985, A giant black bear did ingest a duffle bag of drugs worth $15 million, only to die shortly thereafter. Edit out that very last part out and the rest of this dramatization is an uproarious "what if..," calling to mind other campy animal attack movies like Snakes on a Plane or Anaconda. The commercials and trailer pretty much guaranteed this, and whether you're even a fan of the sub-genre, it's hard to accuse anyone involved of false advertising. 

There's something to be said for a movie that knows exactly what it is. No more and no less. With few grand ambitions, the premise doesn't runs out of gas, clocking in at a lean, mean running time of barely over an hour and a half, which isn't only a relief, but feels just right. After meeting the characters and getting a very straightforward set-up, chaos ensues, followed by lots of laughs and carnage.

In many ways, it's the ideal project for Banks, a filmmaker whose choices have endured the usual mocking reserved for movie stars turned directors. And the decision to make this definitely wasn't an accident, as if to shut down any misconceptions she's taking herself too seriously. But it's still a shrewd move, mostly because it works and ends up being a lot of fun. Apparently, her idea was to view this as the bear's fictional revenge story, with the real animal now gaining an infamy and respect it couldn't have achieved as just a helpless casualty. Strangely, that sort of makes sense.

It's 1985 when drug smuggler Andrew C. Thornton II (Matthew Rhys) drops a large stash of cocaine from his plane before knocking himself unconscious and falling to his death with a duffle bag of drugs in Knoxville, Tennessee. Local detective Bob (Isiah Whitlock Jr.) identifies the body and links the coke to slimy St. Louis drug kingpin Syd White (Ray Liotta). But when the rest of the supply shows up in Chattahoochee National Forest's Blood Mountain, a giant black bear ingests it, becoming hyper-aggressive and out of control, killing a hiker. 

Skipping school, young Dee Dee (Brooklynn Prince) and her friend Henry (Christian Convery) come across the drugs in the forest, putting them in the crosshairs of this dangerous animal. As detective Bob descends upon the forest, Syd sends his right-hand man Daveed (O' Shea Jackson Jr.) and grieving, emotionally fragile son Eddie (Alden Ehrenreich) to find and retrieve the stash. Also arriving is Dee Dee's mom Sari (Keri Russell), a nurse, who searches for the kids with the help of park ranger Liz (Margo Martindale) and wacky wildlife activist Peter (Jesse Tyler Ferguson). But as the bear consumes increasing amounts of cocaine and takes more victims, the chances of anyone escaping alive start to look a whole lot worse.

Despite the early steps taken to set this scenario up, it isn't long before the bear's on the loose eating any brick of coke it can find. The eclectic cast of characters all have differing motivations but once they come to the realization of what's happening, it's not difficult figuring out where the plot has to go next. Jimmy Warden's script may not have a handful of surprises up its sleeve, but the story's what it needs to be as far as crazy cocaine bear movies go.  

Once the action gets going, the gore and excitement rarely let up and Banks does bring a little extra flair to the proceedings and relishes the 80's setting, particularly with some key song choices (like in a thrillingly hilarious Depeche Mode-backed ambulance chase scene), Mark Mothersbaugh's synth-driven score and the costuming selections. We even get an opening "Just Say No" PSA montage featuring Nancy Reagan and in a fitting cameo from Smokey Bear, at least in cardboard form. But it's really "Cokey" we're more interested in and the CGI beast really doesn't look half bad in a movie where they easily could have gotten away with it looking far worse.

Aside from the bear itself, there are some surprising scene stealers, namely Ehrenreich (who has great interplay with Jackson) and a very funny Christian Convery, who gives a performance right out of the precocious, geeky action kid handbook and really nails it. And even if this isn't what most envisioned for a major headlining Keri Russell role, she kind of holds it all together, especially in the second half where her adventure with the kids arguably carries the most interest among numerous sub-plots. Acting vets like Isiah Whitlock and the great Margo Martindale predictably shine, and though this won't be the late Ray Liotta's final screen appearance, he's perfectly cast, comedically sending up the type of sleazy, intimidating heavies he played throughout his career.

In the real story, there's a missing block of time between when the bear took the drugs and its death, so this creatively fills in those blanks. While no one knows exactly what happened, it's a safe bet the animal uneventfully succumbed before it could eat and dismember everyone in a coke-fueled rampage. But a documentary on a quiet, sleeping bear isn't what we came for. All the actors understand the assignment and seem to be having a blast. And why wouldn't they? Cocaine Bear lives up to its outrageous title, which is all that can reasonably be asked of it.

Marriage Story

Director: Noah Baumbach
Starring: Adam Driver, Scarlett Johansson, Laura Dern, Alan Alda, Ray Liotta, Azhy Robertson, Julie Haggerty, Merritt Wever, Mark O' Brien, Mickey Sumner, Wallace Shawn
Running Time: 136 min.
Rating: R

★★★ ½ (out of ★★★★)

Noah Baumbach's Marriage Story opens with a husband and wife each running down a list of the qualities they most admire in their spouse. It goes on for what seems to be about 10 minutes, as we basically learn everything there is to know about each of them as the other supplies a voice-over narration. You're hanging on their every word while watching what amounts to a brief distillation of their everyday lives and basking in the small, everyday details that tell you everything you need to know about these people. And they're both really likable. Smart, funny, ambitious and best of all, they seem like good parents. For a while, you even forget that the other shoe's about to drop, before realizing they're in a therapist's office on the cusp of a divorce, speaking the last nice words we'll hear from them for the rest of the film. Either to or about one another.

From a legal standpoint, this film is probably the most thorough look at the bitter dissolution of a marriage since Kramer vs. Kramer, to which it's already been endlessly and favorably compared. That it comes from Noah Baumbach is of little surprise since every film he writes and directs feels like the kind of project Woody Allen's been failing to make for the past twenty years. If that's the case, then this is Baumbach's Annie Hall, or easily his richest since The Squid and the Whale, which also looked at the nasty fallout from divorce. Few are better chroniclers of human behavior, with an innate ability to zero in on characters' flaws and quirks in ways both dramatically profound and comical.

This is one of his finer examples yet, as he doesn't once step wrong in his depiction of perfectly nice people destroying each other because the system is set up in such a way that they must. Growing apart. Irreconcilable differences. Whatever you want to call it, both go into this process with the noblest, sincerest of intentions before realizing some things must be left up to lawyers and the courts because the whole reason they separated is that they can't agree on gigantic life decisions. Soon, everything's up to the courts and it's a grudge match. Mom vs. Dad.  Los Angles vs. New York. Even Television vs. Broadway.

Successful New York theater director Charlie Barber (Adam Driver) and his wife, former teen movie actress Nicole (Scarlett Johansson) are at a crossroads. Charlie wants them to stay in the New York to raise their 8-year old son, Henry (Azhy Robertson) as he finalizes plans to take his latest production to Broadway, but Nicole wants to head back home to L.A. after being offered a big role in a television pilot. After starring in his plays and raising the profile of his theater company, she's ready to do something for herself and translate this newfound credibility as a stage actress into a Hollywood comeback. It's credibility Charlie feels she wouldn't have if not for the opportunity he gave her, feeling she owes him and the company to stay, frequently putting off any talk of a potential west coast move.

When it becomes clear Nicole's going to L.A., and maybe even staying, with or without him, they separate, determined to amicably divorce without the involvement of lawyers. But when Nicole stays in California with Henry and hires flashy attorney Nora Fanshaw (Laura Dern) to represent her, Charlie's forced to lawyer up himself, having to choose between sleazy, money-hungry Jay Marotta (Ray Liotta) and kind, retired family attorney, Bert Spitz (Alan Alda) in his effort to take his son back to New York. The war is on, with Charlie and Nicole doing saying things that would have seemed unimaginable only a few months earlier. And now they must decide how much they're willing to hurt each other to get what they want, rarely stopping to consider the permanent damage it could be inflicting on their family.

Baumbach does such an exceptional job establishing how far these two have drifted in what seems like a relatively short time, but has been building far longer. While spouses working together may seem like the perfect recipe for marital disaster, it's oddly Nicole's desire to take her career in another direction and Charlie's unwillingness to make certain sacrifices for it that lead to trouble. What's scary is how both initially tackle their separation from a superficially understanding place until they realize the stakes and get attorneys involved. Nicole's mother, Sandra (a delightfully flighty Julie Haggerty) and sister Cassie (Merritt Wever) are so against her divorcing Charlie you'll wonder whose side they're on, leading to a hilarious scene where the latter is roped into clumsily serving him the actual papers. And it makes sense they'd be on his side. He's a good father, seemingly well-liked by everyone and admired by his peers in an industry where people depend on him for his intelligence and creativity.

Charlie's someone who's used to getting what he wants but what makes Driver's performance so inventive is how he hides that while simultaneously being all about it when Charlie's called out. The actor has two or three huge scenes that are so perfectly calibrated in that they make all the other scenes and performances around it better, while occupying residency in your mind long after the credits roll. The most memorable is essentially an inverse of the film's opening, as Charlie and Nicole, now suddenly in the throes of an ugly visitation battle, scream insults at each another until he eventually crosses the line, collapsing in tears on the floor realizing what he's just said. Her reaction is equally shocking, highlighting just how complicated this whole thing is, as well as how few relationship dramas dare even going to these uncomfortably realistic places.

In another scene that's both hilarious and pathetically relatable, a visit from a court-appointed social worker (played by Martha Kelly) to observe Charlie with Henry turns into a complete fiasco, as his insistence in proving everything's fine just further compounds the problem, resulting in an embarrassing medical emergency that Baumbach and the Driver couldn't have juggled any better. There's also an emotionally gut-wrenching musical number late in the film that comes seemingly out of nowhere and everywhere at once, delivering all the more magnificently because of it, with Driver stripping down Charlie's pain and bewilderment in the most public of venues, his hurt exposed for all to witness.

While everone's justifiably raving about Driver's work, Johansson might have the tougher job in a considerably less showy role, with Nicole in constant danger of being classified as the bitchy antagonist in Charlie's story. Of course, doing that simplifies the film's many complexities and the real problem at hand, or at least part of it. That she feels written out of her own life, taking action for the first time and doing what she wants instead of depending on him for support or approval that may never come. Right or wrong, it's this distrust that causes her to lawyer up in a big way. There's no way to determine how much of Johansson's success here stems from playing an actress and channeling some of the creative difficulties in that industry, but rarely has she fit a role as well as  Nicole.

Johansson's provided strong support by Laura Dern, whose feisty attorney Nora Fanshaw represents what she wants: complete autonomy in her life and career. Dern really takes care of business, bolstering what would otherwise be a forgettable role by taking charge of every scene and moment in which she appears. Liotta, and especially Alda, deliver in smaller doses, even if their characters seem to represent certain "types" of lawyers working within the system. Ironically enough, the performance that's gone most underpraised comes from Azhy Robertson as Henry, the young boy caught in the middle of this mess, and seeming fully aware that something's happening with his parents, even if he's not quite old enough to qualify exactly what. He shows his frustration in oddly specific ways that register both big and small, looking upon their situation with an honest, plain-spoken curiosity his parents could probably learn a lot from if they listened. But that's the point. No one can listen.

It's no secret that Baumbach's script is at least semi-autobiographical, making it easier to argue he stacks the deck in Charlie's favor, even if an equally compelling case can be made that Nicole gets exactly what she wants. But the very idea of "winning" and "losing" does very much cut to the crux of what this does end up being about, whether or not the characters ever wanted it that way. Evidence suggested they didn't, but like so many couples breaking up, got caught up in the tide. Because of this, Marriage Story feels bigger than both of them, zeroing in on the fact that most relationships end long before any legal proceedings are underway. And if these two couldn't make it, who can? The end suggests compromise might be possible, but not without a whole lot of pain. The real accomplishment is that we somehow walk away still liking and relating to both of them, while laughing at the absurdity of it all the entire time. It's a nearly impossible balancing act, but one made to look easy by the caliber of talent involved.

The Place Beyond The Pines

Director: Derek Cianfrance
Starring: Ryan Gosling, Bradley Cooper, Eva Mendes, Ray Liotta, Ben Mendelsohn, Rose Byrne, Dane DeHaan, Emory Cohen, Mahershala Ali, Bruce Greenwood, Harris Yulin
Running Time: 140 min.
Rating: R  

★★★★ (out of ★★★★)

                             **Spoiler Warning: This Review Reveals Major Plot Points**  

Almost halfway through The Place Beyond the Pines a title card appears on the screen that reads: 15 YEARS LATER. It's certainly not the first instance of a massive time jump during a film, but what makes this different is the anticipation level. I can't recall a time where I ever wanted to know more about the events that would follow that title screen, as my heart was practically pounding out of my chest. What director and co-writer Derek Cianfrance accomplishes in his sophomore feature is what most filmmakers aspire to get right. Unlike anything released in the past year, it's wildly ambitious and uncompromising, spinning a multi-generational epic that seems destined for cult classic status, if not greater. For almost two and a half hours it remains tight, focused, and unfussy even as tells three intrinsically connected stories that somehow isn't based on a published novel or true crime story, despite feeling so every step of the way.

I've gone back and forth on whether to reveal the big plot point at the movie's crux and determined it's necessary in fully explaining the film's tragic pull. If you don't want to know, it's best you STOP READING NOW and return after you've seen it. While the development is undeniably a shocker, the plot development cuts deeper far than that, exceeding a simple "twist.". Killing the protagonist off halfway through the picture is brave, and while it's been successfully accomplished before, it's impossible to name an instance involving not only this huge a star, but the actor being sold as the face of the picture. Of course, that creative decision alone isn't necessarily worthy of praise. There has to be something to it and it must be a narrative necessity.

Here, the main character perishes because his reckless lifestyle and behavior was bound to eventually lead him there. And also because he has to. This is a film that understands consequences and how decisions and actions reverberate beyond those who are immediately affected to sometimes cross over generations. In this case, from fathers to sons. It's interested in the consequences of death and what that means to those left to pick up the pieces. So, yes, the protagonist is killed off an hour in, but for the remaining time it never once feels like he's gone. It's only through death that the character ends up pushing the story into a far larger context that wouldn't otherwise be possible.

Ryan Gosling is motorcycle stunt rider Luke Glanton, who travels the country performing in circuses without ever really laying down roots anywhere. His latest stop is Schnechtady, New York, where he reconnects with single mother Romina (Eva Mendes), a waitress worn out and beaten down by life. They previously had a fling and now he's discovered her baby boy, Jason, is his. Despite her moving on with boyfriend Kofi (Mahershala Ali), Luke's determined to stick around town to do the right thing and help provide for his son. He takes a job with local auto repair shop owner Robin (Ben Mendolsohn) but his minimum wage salary isn't cutting it, leading the two to pair up and successfully rob some banks in the area.

It isn't long before Luke's worst tendencies grab hold, with his volatile temper threatening to keep him  from his son and his daredevil desire to hit more banks increasing. Robin warns him, "If you ride like thunder, you're gonna crash like lightning." He ends up being right, as Luke's recklessness sets him on a collision course with Officer Avery Cross (Bradley Cooper), creating a situation where only one can escape alive.

The opening hour just might contain the best work Gosling's ever done, which is scary when you consider the ground that covers within the past few years and the fact it's actually a SUPPORTING performance. That it can be said with absolute confidence that the character he creates is as instantly iconic as his unnamed getaway driver in Drive is no small praise, especially considering the surface similarities between the two. We know we're in for something special from the film's sensational opening sequence, as the camera follows Luke from behind into the carnival arena like a cage fighter entering the octagon. He puts on his signature ripped Metallica shirt, which, as James Franco pointed out, already seems like Gosling's new scorpion jacket. And I completely agree with Franco that the character ascends to and owns rebel status within minutes of appearing, before even speaking a word of dialogue.

Luke's an adrenaline junkie who can't control his lapses of slow, simmering rage, but he's also trying to do the right thing and be there for his son in a way he claims his father wasn't for him. It's a sadly prophetic desire, as the harder he tries to do the right thing, the deeper a hole he digs for himself doing wrong. He's doomed and doesn't even know it, pushing for reconciliation with Romina that can't possibly happen regardless of whether a child is in the equation or not. And the more it can't happen, the more he pushes. Boundaries don't exist for Luke, on a bike or in life.

His boss Robin makes the mistake of dangling the carrot of criminality in front of the last type of personality who can handle it. Ben Mendelsohn specializes in playing low-life creeps. At first glance it seems as if Robin is exactly that, but he's not. I love that Mendelsohn plays him as essentially a good guy who went down the wrong path and now just seems bored to tears. He comes across as more of a benevolent mentor and friend than corrupting influence, even if a strong argument can still be made for the latter. When he realizes the monster he's awakened in Luke, he lazily tries to stop it but can't even really muster enough energy to do that. It's too late anyway. There could be a whole other movie about just Robin and I wouldn't complain, but the performance deems it unnecessary, giving us everything we need about his character while withholding what we don't.

When these two are flying high together, so is the film, as the entire opening hour is an addictive rush, filled with images, quotable lines and events destined to burn into my consciousness with Mike Patton's mesmerizing score as the soundtrack. Cianfrance really engulfs the viewer and while this is unquestionably a heightened depiction of Schenectady, accentuating both the city's positive and negative attributes, it's far from an inaccurate one considering it was actually filmed on location. From the few who have seen this, the biggest criticism has been that it suffers after Gosling exits, with the last two thirds of the picture paling in comparison to the first. But I'd argue Luke Glanton's legend only grows after his departure, infusing the rest of the story a larger scope and even greater momentum as everyone is left to pick up the pieces of the damage he's left.

The Bradley Cooper section of the saga is every bit as gripping, while still continuing and finishing what was started. While Officer Avery Cross gets his man and is justifiably hailed by the media as a hero for taking out Luke, it's not that simple. Besides being treated like garbage by his superior and fellow officers, his career's essentially over due to the shootout. That his wife Jennifer (Rose Byrne) and father Al (Harris Yulin) never wanted him to be a cop in the first place is only salt in the wound. But Avery's hardest on himself, wracked with guilt over the fact that he killed a boy's father, emotionally paralyzing him to the point that he can't even look at his own baby boy.

Anyone still doubting last year's discovery of Cooper as a major acting talent or writing it off as just lucking into the right part, should take a look at what he does here, with his most complicated role yet. What's so pitiful about Avery is that, despite the mildly controversial details involving the shooting, he really is a hero who was forced to take the action he did. Cooper plays him at first as kind of a dim bulb, until we slowly realize, with his back against the wall, that he's actually very smart and cunning. He's forced to
be.

Ray Liotta has played a lot of corrupt scumbags in his career but his Peter Deluca just might take the cake. It's a compliment to him that it's hard to think of a more recent movie character I've hated more. I hated the condescending way he talked to Avery. I hated the way he talked to Avery's wife even more. I hated his greediness. Every time this guy speaks it's infuriating, which is exactly what a great villain who gets under your skin should do. Cianfrance takes the well worn plot mechanism of police corruption and makes it fresh and gripping, raising it to the level of Greek tragedy in terms of how it affects all involved, especially those on the periphery.

That Gosling and Cooper never share a scene together and yet the film somehow still feels like their two and a half hour grudge match is a testament speaks not only to their performances, but the rich characterization provided by the script. There's this faint undercurrent running throughout that if Luke and Avery hadn't been on opposite sides of the law then they could have possibly gotten along under different circumstances. That hunch is confirmed in the third act, culminating in a final showdown that can only occur through their sons. And both are very much their father's sons and a product of those events 15 years earlier.

Try as his mother might to keep it from him, you could see how a teen Jason (Dane DeHaan) would want to eventually learn what he could about his biological father. And you could also see how when he finds out about his dad's infamous "motobike bandit," past, that he'd find it really cool and want to know more. At an age where nothing makes sense and there's very little sense of identity, that's a big thing. And it makes sense that path would have to cross with Avery's son, AJ (Emory Cohen). It's not a contrivance. Just a tightly constructed story having its last screw turned. And what a final act it is. It's here where the highly ambitious three-act structure starts to make a lot more sense and all the cards fall into place

Thanks to DeHaan and Cohen's powerfully believable turns there's never any doubt they're the sons of these men despite the lack of any noticeable physical resemblance.DeHaan plays Jason as a sad, quite loner with a short temper while Cohen's AJ has a huge chip on his shoulder, appearing at first to be every bit the thug you'd expect given the years of neglect from his dad. Like their fathers, they're much more alike than different, as both actors transcend those one line descriptions to deliver something deeper and more meaningful. They're also headed for a collision course, finishing the business their dads started, whether they know it or not.

That storytelling this ambitious and expansive could be accomplished on a relatively small budget isn't all that surprising when you consider the ingenuity of the director behind it. Cianfrance's previous collaboration with Gosling, Blue Valentine, stands as one of the few recent films that's grown substantially in stature for me since I first viewed it.  It's a bit more free flowing and messier than this, but contains the same general thematic framework of damaged people as products of unstable families. He just understands what makes his characters tick and knows how to present it onscreen in the most insightful, realistic way possible.

Repeat viewings could easily present the already gripping first hour in a new light knowing what eventually follows. Much like what Affleck did with Boston, Cianfrance turns Schenectady into his personal wasteland of corruption and immorality, where the setting informs the film as much as its characters. If merely the thought of recasting the roles didn't seem to border on sacrilege, there's enough depth and richness here to sustain a long-running television series, with writing and directing that can actually match what we've been seeing now in that medium. With as much ground as this covers, it still even feels like there's more. The Place Beyond The Pines is an epic crime drama that isn't about crime, reminding us that the best ones rarely are.         

Killing Them Softly

Director: Andrew Dominick
Starring: Brad Pitt, Scoot McNairy, Ben Mendelsohn, Richard Jenkins, James Gandolfini, Ray Liotta, Sam Shepard, Vincent Curatola
Running Time: 97 min.
Rating: R

★★ ½ (out of ★★★★)

Then-Presidential candidate Barack Obama and former President George W. Bush are seen or heard so many times in the 2008-set gangster drama Killing Them Softly that they could reasonably share top billing with Brad Pitt and no one would think anything of it. Hardly a scene goes by where they're not either on the radio delivering a speech or stumping for themselves on TV. It's obvious what director Andrew Dominik was going for with his repeated attempts to connect the U.S. economic crisis of six years ago to the state of organized crime, even going so far as to update the setting of George V. Higgins' 1974 novel, Cogan's Trade, to do it. Too obvious. That it seems to be the only thing worth talking about speaks volumes about how distractingly prominent it is, which is a shame because the film isn't without its virtues and actually starts off really well. At best, it's an interesting experiment that again proves Brad Pitt isn't afraid to take chances, but it just runs out of narrative steam after a while, hardly amounting to much by the time the closing credits arrive.

It's the fall of 2008 and a whiny, "in over his head" Frankie (Scoot McNairy) and drug addict Russell (Ben Mendolsohn) are recruited by Mafia boss Johnny "Squirrel" Amato to hold up and rob Markie Trattman's (Ray Liotta) poker room. Since Markie robbed his own game to earn insurance money before with no repercussions, Squirrel figures he'd just be suspected again without getting off as easy this time around. Everything seems to go off without a hitch until hitman Jackie Cogan (Pitt) is tipped off by a mob informant (Richard Jenkins) about what went down and he makes it it his mission to whack the party responsible, which isn't good news for Squirrel, Frankie, Russell, or even the falsely implicated Markie. He enlists the help of hitman Mickey Fallon (James Gandolfini) to get the job done, but things get a little more complicated than expected.  

When director Andrew Dominik focuses solely on the task at hand in developing this story and its characters, the results are surprisingly successful, especially in the film's engaging opening hour. When he turns his attention to overt symbolism and attempts to draw broad parallels between the country's financial collapse due to a lack of oversight and the political hiearachy within organized crime, the film fails miserably. Besides the comparison itself being somewhat of a stretch (at least in the context it's presented), Dominick just won't give the idea a rest, even when the heavy-handed allegorical flashiness is clearly detrimental, if not completely at odds, with the inherent grittiness of the material. The filmmakers probably would have been better off just setting this in 1974 and calling it Cogan's Trade since it does seem like that's what they really wanted to do the whole time, with the script basically shouting for it at points. If it's any relief, Roberta Flack's 70's hit does not at any point make a soundtrack appearance but the film's title is referenced through a memorable dialogue exchange that at least offers somewhat of a clue as to its meaning. I was satisfied, if completely unsurprised, by the explanation. But least that has more to do with an emotional crisis than a financial one.     

A lot of interesting things occur within the opening hour, too many of them under-cut with reminders that IT'S 2008 AND THERE'S A PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION COMING UP. In case you haven't heard. And hear you will. During the big hold-up. In the mobster's car radios. Everywhere. Do mobsters listen to talk radio? No matter. In this film they do it non-stop just so we get the message. The sad part is that most everything else works until the half-way point. President Bush's TV cameo aside, the big hold-up scene crackles with intensity and Scoot McNairy (who's the real lead here) is as impressive in this as we was in Argo last year, and just as unrecognizable as the bumbling, child-like Frankie. You almost feel sorry for a guy so clearly playing out of his league, while his partner in crime Russell is well played by a scary Mendelsohn as an  unpredictably dangerous wildcard.

Pitt's role is much smaller than ads let on but also a lot cooler and more calculated, dressed in all black and making his intro to Johnny Cash's "The Man Comes Around." He makes a co-starring part seem larger and more important than it should on the strength of his charisma, used to menacing effect as Cogan. This also marks one of the final supporting performances in what was the increasingly prolific big screen career of the late James Gandolfini. And I'm glad there's still a few films of his still coming down the pike because he's much better than what he's saddled with here. As an aging, hot-headed hitman addicted to drugs and hookers he goes toe-to-toe with Pitt and more than holds his own, even if I'm completely uncertain as to the character's purpose in the story. It's right around this point that the film starts spinning its wheels and eventually limps over the finish line without much to show for it.  

Less a crime drama than a thematic bludgeoning, the character-centric moments of Killing Them Softly are subtle, and at times even masterful.  It's just a shame most of that is masked under a heavy load of pretension and overt symbolism. Being someone who's generally no big fan of mob movies in general, I was surprised how well the crime component played for me and how much potential it had, despite a myriad of issues that seemed fixable with a re-write or two. It was also impossible to market this as a "guy movie" since there's very little action to speak of and hardly a woman to be found. Even with a trimmed running time, calling this a tough sell is an understatement. Cited as a rare flop for Pitt, it isn't as worthless as you've heard, and at least undeserving of the "F" cinemascore rating thrust upon it by dejected audiences expecting an action thriller from the star. This is about as far from that as it gets, its meditative tone and style more closely resembling a crime film released in 1974 than 2008 or 2012. That's its biggest strength. Its weaknesses are scattered almost everywhere else, with its admittedly silly title actually representing the least of its problems.