So here’s a movie perfectly tailored to its time. Set and shot during a London lock down, it represents both the claustrophobia and the frustration of the general population through one specific couple. It’s almost right, but zeitgeist seems incomplete…there’s no fear. No one seems to be actually concerned about, you know, all the death. They are mainly just inconvenienced.
Anne’s character has been relegated to working from home and making tough calls, quite literally, from firing a bunch of seemingly ice coworkers to dealing with her Stillerized to perfection boss. Chewitel’s been furloughed from his driving job. They are both stuck inside, albeit in a very nice spacious house with every possible convenience. It might have been cozy, but alas…they are separating as a couple after ten years. Anne’s decision. It seems that her motorcycle riding wild phase is over and as a CEO of an international company she’s no longer all that interested in slumming it with a van driver, albeit a poetry reciting one. So decidedly not cozy in that house, although being stuck while separating creates for some excellent dramatic and comedy and both stars really get to show off their chops, especially Anne, who’s got the best wackiest monologues. She’s actually great here, shifting gears all over the place to create a complicated and not necessarily likeable but fun to watch character and not once does she jump into a song. The always excellent Chewitel never quite sells it all the way for me as a motorcycle rebel with an arrest record, he’s much more of a street poet, there’s just something inherently mild and soft about him, despite the fact that he cuts a very nice (live wild or die motorbike riding desperado) figure in his boxer briefs. Together they make a great team and are an absolute pleasure to watch, their best scenes when it’s just the two of them. Because, frankly, the movie needs nothing more. It’s great at first, in a way a really good play with A list talent can be. But alas, this is a movie, a movie from a major action director (Mr. and Mrs. Smith, Bourne, Jumper) so action it gets. A minimal locked down action, but still. It must have been very restricting for Doug Liman, but he managed. After all, he’s had a script written by someone who’s no stranger to action/suspense. Enter the heist. Because what relationship drama can’t be improved by a heist. This is where movie evolves or devolves, depending on your perspective and preferences. I found it to be thoroughly unnecessary and tonally inconsistent, almost like the movie tried to both appease the intellectual audience in it for a relatable quiet(ish) drama and the hoi polloi jonesing for action. Their rationalization behind the theft of a three million dollar diamond is basically…it’s a form of justice. Justice for Anne, who’ll no longer have to pander to the sort of people who buy or sell 3M worth of jewels, justice for Chewitel who has been railroaded by an arrest record and now can’t get a proper job and justice for the system which’ll get a third of a share. Why, it’s practically noble. It just isn’t all that interesting, somehow. And nowhere near as much fun as watching Chewitel stroll their empty street reciting poetry or Anne go on a crazy rant about a life changing experience. It’s still fun, mind you, heists are inherently fun, even the ones where it’s mostly just walking into a locked down store and taking things. The main joke here is that Chewitel has to do it using an ID under the name of Edgar Allan Poe, apparently a wildly recognizable name never more. So is it worth a watch? Yeah, yes, I’d say so. My fiancé proclaimed it…too soon. But who’s to say people are going to want to watch movies about lock down later on when it (one can hope) becomes but a distant nightmare. For now it was entertaining and done cleverly, albeit seemingly recklessly at times. So if you’re willing to roll with all its tonal inconsistencies, this is a movie that does drama, comedy, heist and turns itself around into a romcom all to please and delight its audience. It tries like an ingenue at an audition. When really just the star talent and their chemistry here might have been enough. Something of an overkill, but then again it comes from action. Livelier than you might expect. Also smarter than you might expect. There’s some excellent writing here, that alone is worth the time. Check it out for yourself, this one is for the positive side of the mixed reviews for the movie.
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