Logan Lucky
by George Wolf, MaddWolf.com
You’re not long into director Steven Soderbergh’s latest before you expect to see Brad Pitt standing around eating something.
Why?
Because Logan Lucky is essentially Soderbergh’s Ocean’s 11 with hillbillies, which had to intrigue Soderbergh when he first read the script from Rebecca Blunt. If that is her real name.
No, seriously, Blunt is rumored to be a pseudonym for the actual writer, who should just ‘fess up and take credit for this hoot of a heist homage.
Jimmy Logan (Channing Tatum) gets laid off from his job fixing sinkholes underneath Charlotte Motor Speedway, so he puts together a 10-point plan for his next career move. Two of those points are labeled “s@!# happens.”
The rest is simple.
Jimmy, his one-armed brother Clyde (Adam Driver) and their sister Mellie (Riley Keough), will bust redneck robber Joe Bang (Daniel Craig) out of jail to help them rob the speedway during the biggest NASCAR race of the year, and then have Joe back in the slam before anyone is the wiser.
Soderbergh structures everything to parallel his Ocean‘s films so closely that when he finally addresses that elephant outright, the only surprise is how often the rubes draw a better hand than the Vegas pretty boys.
Logan serves up indelible characters, fun suspense, finely tuned plotting and solid humor, including a hilarious bit with a prison warden (Dwight Yoakam) explaining to some rioting inmates why the next Games of Thrones novel isn’t out yet.
As Bang, Craig is a flat out riot, doing fine justice to the best character name since Chest Rockwell, and standing out in an ensemble (also including Katie Holmes, Seth MacFarlane, Katherine Waterston, Hilary Swank and Sebastian Stan) that shines from top to toe.
Assembled as precisely as a letter-perfect grift, Logan Lucky has smarts, charm and some downright weirdness. It’s a late August blast with more than enough fun to beat our summertime blues.
The Hitman’s Bodyguard
by Hope Madden, MaddWolf.com
Who remembers Safe House, the passable 2012 action flick that sees Ryan Reynolds in over his head trying to keep an international assassin, played by Denzel Washington, safe?
Well, lobotomize Safe House, swap in Samuel L. Jackson for Denzel, trade grit for humor and you have the mid-August version of an action comedy, The Hitman’s Bodyguard.
Jackson is Darius Kincaid.
No he isn’t. He’s an underwritten tough guy, filled out with characteristic Jacksonisms: foul language and swagger. He’s Samuel L. Jackson, people!
Likewise, Reynolds may go by Michael Bryce, but this is prototypical Reynolds, all sarcastic charm and self-loathing.
Bring them together: glib meets badass. They take a bullet-riddled road trip, Bryce trying to keep Kincaid safe long enough to testify against the former president of Belarus, a war criminal and all-around evildoer, played, naturally, by Gary Oldman.
Of course he is.
No, not a lot of acting muscles are being overworked in this one.
Writing muscles either, for that matter. The film coasts on mostly ludicrous but sometimes fun set pieces energized by the silly sniping happening as the Jackson/Reynolds bromance blossoms.
Director Patrick Hughes (Expendables 3 – did we know there were 3?) relies heavily on his cast and their individual brands. It’s like shorthand. No reason for character development, which is a good thing because scribe Tom O’Connor isn’t strong.
Hughes has trouble balancing the action, humor and unexpected romance. Reynolds’s security expert pines for the Interpol agent that left him; meanwhile, Jackson’s assassin misses his Mrs. (Salma Hayak, funny).
But, hey, do you like Ryan Reynolds, Samuel L. Jackson and Gary Oldman? Because the three of them play the three of them in a disposable action comedy coming out this weekend.
Brigsby Bear
by George Wolf, MaddWolf.com
When does our grip on the past get in the way of our future?
Why is it so difficult to accept some people as they are?
And who would expect some doofuses from SNL to be doing such serious pondering?
Okay, “doofuses” is a bit harsh, but when you see Andy Samberg’s Lonely Island Productions in the opening credits, you don’t expect the thoughtful nuance that Brigsby Bear delivers.
SNL vet Kyle Mooney stars as James, a twenty-something man living in a secluded compound in the Utah desert with his parents (Mark Hamill, Jane Adams). Except they’re not his parents.
From the time James was a small boy, they’ve been his captors, and he’s been the sole audience for all the strange episodes of Brigsby Bear.
When he’s reunited with his real parents (Matt Walsh, Michaela Watkins), James’s acclimation is hampered by a persistent obsession with Brigsby, the only TV show he has ever known.
Anxious for new Brigsby adventures, James gets a load of all the new technology available to him, and suddenly making his very own Brigsby movie seems like it would be, as his new friends say, “dope (stuff), dude.”
It’s a setup that could easily have gone off the rails with the goofiness of a throwaway sketch, but director Dave McCary’s feature debut gradually wins you over with its abundance of warm sincerity. James is certainly a curiosity, but the film never wields him as a vehicle for cheap manipulation.
Mooney, who also co-wrote the script, delivers a surprisingly touching performance, and he makes James’s world a tender, inviting place that erases any urges for pity with an uncompromising sense of wonder.
Hamill leads the fine supporting ensemble with a turn that of course benefits from his long history as an icon of fandom. But again, the undercurrent is always one of respect for the lives touched rather than a mockery of the fanaticism, personified by a local cop (a stellar Greg Kinnear) who joins the Brigsby production in a role fairly close to a certain Jedi master.
Sure, there’s ridiculousness to be found in Brigsby Bear, but there’s way too much heart to call it “guilty.”
Just call it a pleasure.
