Prime Time: Play Dirty (2025)

Another attempt to successfully adapt some of the "Parker" books, written by Donald E. Westlake, into something that could be viewed as a profitable movie property, Play Dirty has the bonus of being directed by Shane Black, who also worked with Charles Mondry and Anthony Bagarozzi to create the screenplay. Unfortunately, it's the Shane Black of recent years, and not peak Shane Black. And he's decided to give himself a challenge by putting Mark Wahlberg in the main role.

Parker (Wahlberg) is involved in a heist that ends well, until his team is killed off by someone who betrays them. Aiming to get another payday lined up, as well as some revenge, Parker ends up helping Zen (Rosa Salazar) with a planned robbery that will once again get him targeted by the powerful and dangerous Lozini (Tony Shalhoub). Lozini has his goons, but Parker has Zen, Grofield (LaKeith Stanfield), Ed and Brenda (Keegan-Michael Key and Claire Lovering), and Stan (Chai Hansen). And he aims to stay one or two steps ahead of everyone else.

This should be great. It's a perfect marriage of material and writer-director. So the fact that it isn't feels like a confirmation that things started to go wrong when the casting decisions were made. Wahlberg can be good in movie roles, and I've enjoyed him in many other features over the years, but it has become harder and harder to view him as some kind of cheeky charmer with every opportunity to be reminded of how he puts himself across in everyday life. Not that Play Dirty necessarily wants the character to be viewed that way, but, then again, the film doesn't ever really settle on what it wants.

This is a mess, disappointingly inconsistent as it lurches from one unsteady set-piece to the next. Parker is sometimes ready to quip and wink at others, sometimes just intent on being dead-eyed and murderous. The characters around him have the potential to be a fun mix, but most of them are either underused or not used in the right way. This should have been a home run for Shane Black. He barely avoids a strike out.

Salazar is a great fit for her role, and arguably the highlight of the film. Other standouts include Hansen, Chukwudi Iwuji (who plays someone caught up in the unfolding scheme), and Nat Wolff as one of the main generals to Lozini. That maybe tells you all you need to know. Wahlberg has a bit of presence, but no charisma, Stanfield is crying out to be allowed to have more fun with his role, and both Key and Lovering seem to have been picked for one scene that makes decent use of them.

There are similarities between bad action movies and bad comedies. Cast the wrong person in the lead and you're scuppered. Punchlines aren't effective if nobody cares about the setups. And you can't cover up your mistakes by simply making things louder and busier on the way to a weak and completely mishandled ending. Play Dirty is a bad action movie, but it occasionally mixes things up by also being a bad comedy. The opening sequence is decent, and had me getting my hopes up for the rest of the film, but it quickly goes downhill from there.

I think it's unlikely to happen, but I'd love to see Shane Black take things down a notch and bring us a stripped-down and low-budget detective film for his next feature. Something that would sit nicely alongside his best work, but also sticks to a grittier tone that might still surprise his fans. 

3/10

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Ani-MAY-tion: Cars (2006)

I heard about Cars being made. I wasn’t interested. I saw the trailer for Cars. I wasn’t interested. Cars came and went at the cinema. I wasn’t interested. So why do I own all three Cars movies? Well, I decided I would get them for free when Disney still offered a decent reward scheme on their website. I used points on them, but still couldn’t work up any enthusiasm to actually watch any of them. That changes now. I am determined to watch all three this month, for better or worse. Considering how much I enjoyed this, it may be for the better.

Owen Wilson voices a car named Lightning McQueen, a cocky young racer who is frustrated when his latest race ends in a 3-way tie. The winner will be decided in another race in California, which means a long journey across the country. There’s an unplanned diversion though, and McQueen ends up stuck in the small town of Radiator Springs, where the pace of life is quite a bit slower. Taking things a bit slower can give you plenty of time to learn more and plan ahead better, but that isn’t how McQueen views the situation, despite the patience and determination of the locals.

Directed by John Lasseter and Joe Ranft, who also co-wrote the screenplay with a handful of other writers, Cars isn’t the sharpest Pixar movie, nor is it the wittiest. That’s a high bar though, and I will usually find plenty to enjoy in every one of their animated treats. The main pleasure here comes from the different characters surrounding our misguided lead, voiced by the likes of Paul Newman, Bonnie Hunt, Larry The Cable Guy, and Tony Shalhoub. There’s also a gorgeous visual style throughout, as you would expect, with the characters and environment in perfect simpatico, presenting a world that is so well-realised that viewers can easily accept everything onscreen without any questions, at least until after the end credits have rolled.

Wilson is a good choice for the lead role, his particular vocal style softening the edges of a character that could have been much more annoying throughout the first half of the film. Newman is used well as the elder who offers some sage advice to someone who needs to start listening to others. Both Bonnie Hunt and Larry The Cable Guy are great in main supporting roles, the former being very sweet while the latter delivers plenty of laughs, and Shalhoub gets to steal one or two scenes as Luigi, a huge fan of Ferraris. There are also delightful performances from Paul Dooley, Michael Keaton, George Carlin, Edie McClurg, Richard Kind, and John Ratzenberger (in what I would say is his biggest Pixar role, and allows him to deliver a superb set of meta gags over the end credits).

The pacing is slightly off, just slightly, and there’s an uninspired soundtrack, as well as a clumsy attempt to shoehorn in an extra narrative strand about the small towns that have suffered when new road developments were planned to bypass them, but the sweetness and humour always work well enough to keep you smiling as you wait for the predictable, and rewarding, finale. AND you get a number of cameos that should please motor-racing fans.

It may all be downhill from here, I have heard bad things about at least one of the sequels, but I am now temporarily optimistic about finally making time for this trilogy. I recommend this one to Pixar fans, but (as ever) . . . mileage may vary.

7/10

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Noir-vember: The Man Who Wasn't There (2001)

A film I haven’t seen since I picked it up on VHS when it was first released, I was very keen to revisit The Man Who Wasn’t There, a film that arguably remains the most overlooked title in the filmography of the Coen brothers (certainly from the past couple of decades anyway).

Billy Bob Thornton plays the main character, Ed Crane. He runs a barbershop with his brother, Frank (Michael Badalucco), and plods along in his marriage to Doris (Frances McDormand). A chance encounter with a customer (Jon Polito) who has a grand business plan leads to Ed setting out to blackmail Big Dave Brewster (James Gandolfini). He knows that Dave and Doris have been having an affair, but this perceived opportunity for success could lead to disaster. And death.

Shot in beautiful black and white (courtesy of the great Roger Deakins), The Man Who Wasn’t There may not be as sharp as other Coen brothers movies, and it may run too closely to some of their best works, but it remains a fantastic slice of straightforward noir. The brothers don’t want to twist things too much here, they just want to tell a story well worth telling.

The cast are almost all perfect, with Thornton at his laconic best in the lead role. He has rarely been an actor who exaggerates his mannerisms or catches your eye with histrionics (the excellent Sling Blade aside), making him an ideal choice to carry a film with this title. McDormand is as good as ever, playing a flawed woman who clearly still has love there for her husband. Gandolfini and Polito both make a strong impression with more limited screentime and Tony Shalhoub has one of his best movie roles, playing an expensive lawyer who believes himself unable to lose a court case. There are also enjoyable turns from Badalucco, Richard Jenkins, and Scarlett Johansson, with the latter representing a fresh start, optimism, and purity in the mind of Thornton’s character.

It would be wrong to try and convince anyone that this is one of the very best movies from the Coen brothers. That isn’t true. But it would also be wrong to leave it languishing in the forgotten limbo it seems to have been cast into over the past twenty years. It may not be a masterpiece, and it isn’t out to feel fresh or full of surprises, but it is a lovingly crafted piece of drama, using a top-notch cast to draw you into a tale of love, death, and greed for a couple of hours.

8/10

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Quick Change (1990)

Based on a book of the same name by Jay Cronley, that had previously been made into a French movie named Hold-Up, Quick Change is one of the few movies that I would refer to as underrated, if I ever used that word. But I try not to. Underrated, overrated, these things simply mean that you liked or disliked a film in a way you feel is different from the majority opinion. So let me just say that I have always liked Quick Change a lot more than the majority of film fans.

To date, this is the only film directed by Bill Murray (well . . . he co-directed with Howard Franklin, who also wrote the screenplay) and I wish that he'd decided to give it another go at some point, because this is a very enjoyable comedy that puts together a fantastic cast and makes great use of most of them.

The plot is simple. Murray dresses up as a clown and robs a bank. His plan is to delay the police for as long as possible while he and his accomplices get out of the city. They could be halfway to a tropical island before the police even risk storming into the bank to free the hostages. That doesn't happen though. Chief Rotzinger (Jason Robards) figures out what could be happening, which means the pursuit is on. The bank robbery itself was easy, the hard part is getting out of the city.

Alongside Murray and Robards, this cast includes Geena Davis (who I will watch in anything), Randy Quaid (who I am happy to watch in anything that isn't home-made), Phil Hartman, Tony Shalhoub, Stanley Tucci, and Kurtwood Smith. The latter two may be underused but they're still welcome additions to the cast list.

As well as a fun heist movie and a comedy of errors, Quick Change works as a very strange love letter to New York. The frustration of living in the city is what leads to the plan, and all of the obstacles in the way of the escaping robbers stem directly from the attitudes of the other New Yorkers that they meet, be they opportunistic car thieves, unhelpful construction workers, cab drivers who haven't mastered the language yet (a crude stereotype but one improved by the performance of Shalhoub), jobsworth bus drivers (a scene-stealinng turn from Philip Bosco), or members of the local mafia.

As I said, I have always liked this film more than the majority of film fans. I don't think that will ever change, but I'll be happy if I can convince one or two others to at least give it a chance.

8/10

A region 1 disc can be bought here.

The Siege (1998)

The Siege is an interesting thriller that may seem overly familiar to viewers now, but certainly seemed quite unique and daring when first released back in 1998. I'm not going to say that it was the first film of this kind, but I will say that after the real shock of 9/11 and then the subsequent escalating war on terror it has become a movie unfairly overshadowed by many more recent releases (including, for example, the thought-provoking Unthinkable).

The basic plot of The Siege concerns retaliation against America, on American soil, by a number of terrorist cells who want one of their leaders returned to them unharmed. That would be all well and good, but nobody is admitting that they actually HAVE the leader in their custody, which makes for quite a stalemate. Caught up in the middle of this tension is staunch federal agent Denzel Washington, working alongside his partner Tony Shalhoub, and a CIA operative (Annette Bening) who keeps clashing with them as she works on her own agenda. Bruce Willis plays Major General William Devereaux, a man who may prove useful or may, in fact, prove to be the most damaging individual in the city.

With Edward Zwick in the director's chair you know that this isn't going to be a vapid and glossy action movie, though perhaps they tried to market it that way when it was first released (I really don't recall). Zwick is the guy who will take a closer look at courage and morality and will make it interesting, entertaining and invested with emotion. That blend isn't always appealing to some, and he doesn't always get it right, but I've enjoyed many of his movies BECAUSE of the mix of emotion and intellect that I'm sure provides plenty of ammunition for his detractors.

Bruce Willis isn't given too much screen-time here, so don't let his presence put you off if you're not a fan (I usually quite like him, but realise that many don't). The main focus here stays on the triangle formed by Denzel, who is on his usual good form, Shalhoub, who is given one of his better movie roles and does great with it, and Bening, who is the weak link, despite how much more interesting her character could have been. I've liked Bening in a lot of movies and tend to think that her weak turn here is more the result of some poor writing than any major failing on her part. And it's not that she's bad, it's just that she should have been better. Sami Bouajila does okay as Samir Nazhde, who might be able to help the good guys stop further attacks if they can keep him in the game long enough, and David Proval does well as another agent doggedly trying to get information that will help break the case.

The screenplay by Zwick, Lawrence Wright and Menno Meyjes is surprisingly good. While the first half of the movie seems to hit standard beats and be walking a well-worn path, the second half takes a different direction and looks at things from a completely different angle. The fact that it was a very prescient movie also adds to its interest. Protests were held by many Muslims and Arab groups when it was initially released, but the film has an ace or two up its sleeve to counter the criticism it received. One of those comes in the shape of Tony Shalhoub's character, a Lebanese-American who is undeniably a good guy through and through. The other ace? Well, I wouldn't want to give too much away. Needless to say, the film shows racial profiling and stereotyping as both a tool used by government agencies and also a mistake made by people driven to distraction while something possibly much worse transpires before their very eyes.

It's a flawed film, as most of Edward Zwick's movies are, but it's also well worth watching, especially in light of events that we've seen since the turn of the 21st century.

7/10

http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Siege-Blu-ray-Edward-Zwick/dp/B002M4CF0A/ref=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&qid=1361828833&sr=8-5

1408 (2007)

A movie based on the work of Stephen King about a writer possibly losing his mind as a haunted hotel causes him no ends of problem, it is almost inevitable that you can't watch or review 1408 without thinking of The Shining. However, it is to the credit of the author, the screenwriters who adapted his tale and director Mikael Hafstrom that 1408 manages to take fairly familiar material and make it feel fresh and interesting.

When I first saw 1408 I wasn't impressed. I'm still not completely won over by it but I have to now admit that it deserves a lot of credit for many of the little touches scattered throughout. The basic premise is simple enough, John Cusack plays a writer who visits haunted locations and writes about them. It's not great literature but it's a job. When he comes across the history of the titular room in The Dolphin Hotel, however, he views it as an essential experience and refuses to be dissuaded by the hotel manager (Samuel L. Jackson). But nobody has lasted more than an hour in room 1408 and there have been 56 deaths. Will there be a 57th?

The most impressive thing about this movie is how it takes the source material and expands upon it without losing the essence of the story or ever feeling padded out. This is down to a mixture of good writing, great performances and every trick in the book being used to keep things visually interesting onscreen.

John Cusack is superb in the central role as a man who starts off cynical and selfish and is pushed over the edge into an abyss of potential insanity and dread. Going through a whole range of emotions, from depression to elation to all-out rage, Cusack acquits himself very well. Samuel L. Jackson is also very good in his small, but crucial, role. Then we have support from Mary McCormack, Tony Shalhoub, Len Cariou, Jasmine Jessica Anthony and a number of other people who all do great work.

Matt Greenberg, Scott Alexander and Larry Karaszewski deserve credit for their work in adapting the short story into something that holds your attention and builds up an atmosphere of real horror. There may be a few jump scares here and there, and there may not be enough here to please fans of gore and/or more standard scares, but the film develops into something very unsettling and decidedly . . . . . off-kilter as the room does all it can to affect Cusack's character.

Director Hafstrom hasn't done anything else quite as good as this since but that's okay. It's not that his other movies have been terrible, the fact is that 1408 is a rather simple, but also rather great, modern horror.

"Stay scared".

8/10.

http://www.amazon.com/1408-Two-Disc-Collectors-John-Cusack/dp/B000UNYJLS/ref=sr_1_4?s=movies-tv&ie=UTF8&qid=1400011153&sr=1-4&keywords=1408