Before the Devil Knows Your Dead

So I've watched a few other movies besides this one in the last week, but they were films I've already watched this year - The Orphanage and Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. Finally did pop in something new the other night, one I had tried to get to last year in the theatre but just couldn't get there. BTDKYD, for the sake of my fingers and time, is directed by the legend Sidney Lumet. The man has been directing films for 50 years. His first feature was in 1957 with 12 Angry men, a favorite. He has directed several classic films, among them Serpico, Dog Day Afternoon, and Network. He also directed a guilty pleasure of mine - Running on Empty - which resulted in an Oscar nomination for the Late River Phoenix. That's a beautiful little film that I recommend you take a look at. On the other hand, in the "everyone has their Hook" vein, he directed the Wiz, which is almost unwatchable - I tried a year ago.

So BTDKYD, where does it fall? Well it isn't Hook, but it's no 12 Angry Men either. It's a well directed film, a very well acted film, but it's a film about everything going wrong for a group of people that, frankly, everything should go wrong for. They aren't the people you hate so much that as things start going wrong you enjoy it, but they are not sympathetic enough to make you feel bad for them either. It's like watching a very well organized and choriographed train wreck for 2 hours. Well made but not terribly engaging. And then, much like Two Lane Black Top, it just ends. And when the credits roll you aren't saying to yourself, "boy I didn't like that ending" or "I wonder what happens next with these characters?". You're saying to the screen, "Um... you forgot to wrap up that story...there are still characters that have not had their arcs resolved". This is a C.