Not a lot of interesting movies have opened lately, so this Monday is as good a time as any to review some of the very last of last year’s crop. And why not kick things off with three low-key indie crime thrillers that are all worth a watch…to varying degrees…
Blood Ties…This 70’s-set crime drama has an excellent cast (Clive Owen, Mila Kunis, Marion Cotillard to name a few) but this tale of a hoodlum brother (Owen) getting out of prison to reconnect with his cop younger brother has one major flaw: it features the most unintentionally unlikable protagonist I’ve seen in a while. By that, I mean Billy Crudup’s supposedly good guy cop brother begins the movie by getting the husband of the woman he loves (Zoe Saldana) arrested and continues shady romantic tactics and trying to arrest his brother from there. The movie’s real secret weapon is the women around the edges of the story as both Cotillard and an especially excellent Saldana act with a ferocity that makes you wish they were the main characters instead. Grade: B-
Starred Up…An interesting premise, but the main draw here is a pair of terrific performances at its center. “Starred Up” is about a quick-tempered juvenile offender (“Unbroken”‘s Jack O’Connell) who “graduates” to adult prison when he ages out of juvie, but he winds up being in the same prison as his life-sentence serving father (Ben Mendelsohn). His son’s violent outbursts quickly put him on the wrong side of the prison’s gang leaders, and his father worries about protecting him.
There’s a subplot involving a kindly prison therapist (Homeland’s Rupert Friend) that never goes deep enough—although the therapy getting constantly interrupted by violent outbursts is realistic, it’s not exactly satisfying—and sometimes the strong British accents need subtitles to understand what they’re saying, but I was surprised at how satisfying the emotional dynamics between father and son were. The emotional payoff is affecting and memorable (rare for a prison movie), the pull between Friend’s supportive therapist and Mendelsohn’s protective father leads to some interesting stuff about nature vs. nurture, and O’Connell and Mendelsohn deliver performances that are by turns scary, pitiful, funny, vulnerable, intense, complex, and sympathetic. I’m enjoying this movie more thinking back on it than I did when I was watching it, and I think a lot of it is due to just how satisfying the ending is. I won’t lie, the ending (and the shot of Mendelsohn looking at an aged “I love you daddy” painting his son created for him when he was younger) really got to me. Grade: B+
The Two Faces of January…A small-scale con-man (Oscar Isaacs) in Greece picks up two rich American tourists (Kristen Dunst and Viggo Mortensen) but maybe they are more dangerous than he is as it becomes clear that someone is after them and questions rise about just where he got all that money from. Beautiful scenery and decent performances will keep you watching, but this is never more than an average thriller. In a strange way, it’s sleepy pace actually works for it as this is a film you come to more to soak in the atmosphere than to be riveted by the plot. Grade: B-