Stillwater. (15.)
Directed by Tom McCarthy
Starring Matt Damon, Camille Cottin, Abigail Breslin, Lilou Siauvaud, Anne le Ny and Deanna Dunagan. In cinemas. 140 mins.
Spotlight, writer/ director McCarthy's previous film, was a stealth Oscar winner. People saw it and thought it was pretty good but were still quite surprised when it scooped the big prize. Then within a year or so, nobody ever thought about it again. Like a master assassin, it took out the target and erased itself from history. Still, at the very least, with Spotlight, a newspaper drama about crusading journalists exposing paedophile priests, you knew where you were. For a follow up he's concocted a cross-cultural, fish-out-of-water, odd couple romcom loosely based on the Amanda Knox case that will keep audiences off balance for every one of its 140 minutes. These still waters may not run deep but they sure are muddy.
Drunk perhaps on his Oscar success, for his next trick he's decided to fix up a Trump-supporting, gun-owning Oklahoma oil worker, (Damon) with a French theatre actress single mother (Cottin.) If they can find common ground, then there must be hope for the world at large. Bill Baker is in Marseilles visiting his daughter (Breslin) in prison, locked up for the notorious, headline-grabbing murder of her flatmate and lover. When the prosecutor refuses to reinvestigate based on new evidence, Damon decides to do it himself. His efforts are severely hampered by his perfectly reasonable and entirely ethical choice not to learn the demon French until, voilà, he chances upon bi-lingual Virginie who offers to help.
The film enters the story half a decade after the court case and once the focus on Baker's growing friendship with Virginie and her cute young daughter, (Siauvaud) is established the narrative only really has three issues to resolve: is his daughter really innocent; will Baker live up to his daughter’s prediction that messing up is an innate part of his character; and how will this impact on the film's treatise on the way America deals with the rest of the world.
Cottin is perhaps the film's liveliest presence. She's trays French, yet appealing. But Damon is the film. The film is nice, decent Hollywood examining a deplorable, an American specimen that it doesn't understand. But the only way it can do it is by shaping Baker in its own image. Damon is very good as the kind of god-fearing American who takes his cap off for grace and then puts it back on for the meal, addresses everybody as Yes ma'am/ sir and manages to be incredibly overbearing and intimidating but still humble. But he isn't convincing for a moment. There is much talk of his past eff ups with booze and drugs, but you don't believe he would've done any of that. He's just like a film that dawdles along pleasantly enough, is pleasantly low key and unassuming, yet totally ridiculous.
Directed by Tom McCarthy
Starring Matt Damon, Camille Cottin, Abigail Breslin, Lilou Siauvaud, Anne le Ny and Deanna Dunagan. In cinemas. 140 mins.
Spotlight, writer/ director McCarthy's previous film, was a stealth Oscar winner. People saw it and thought it was pretty good but were still quite surprised when it scooped the big prize. Then within a year or so, nobody ever thought about it again. Like a master assassin, it took out the target and erased itself from history. Still, at the very least, with Spotlight, a newspaper drama about crusading journalists exposing paedophile priests, you knew where you were. For a follow up he's concocted a cross-cultural, fish-out-of-water, odd couple romcom loosely based on the Amanda Knox case that will keep audiences off balance for every one of its 140 minutes. These still waters may not run deep but they sure are muddy.
Drunk perhaps on his Oscar success, for his next trick he's decided to fix up a Trump-supporting, gun-owning Oklahoma oil worker, (Damon) with a French theatre actress single mother (Cottin.) If they can find common ground, then there must be hope for the world at large. Bill Baker is in Marseilles visiting his daughter (Breslin) in prison, locked up for the notorious, headline-grabbing murder of her flatmate and lover. When the prosecutor refuses to reinvestigate based on new evidence, Damon decides to do it himself. His efforts are severely hampered by his perfectly reasonable and entirely ethical choice not to learn the demon French until, voilà, he chances upon bi-lingual Virginie who offers to help.
The film enters the story half a decade after the court case and once the focus on Baker's growing friendship with Virginie and her cute young daughter, (Siauvaud) is established the narrative only really has three issues to resolve: is his daughter really innocent; will Baker live up to his daughter’s prediction that messing up is an innate part of his character; and how will this impact on the film's treatise on the way America deals with the rest of the world.
Cottin is perhaps the film's liveliest presence. She's trays French, yet appealing. But Damon is the film. The film is nice, decent Hollywood examining a deplorable, an American specimen that it doesn't understand. But the only way it can do it is by shaping Baker in its own image. Damon is very good as the kind of god-fearing American who takes his cap off for grace and then puts it back on for the meal, addresses everybody as Yes ma'am/ sir and manages to be incredibly overbearing and intimidating but still humble. But he isn't convincing for a moment. There is much talk of his past eff ups with booze and drugs, but you don't believe he would've done any of that. He's just like a film that dawdles along pleasantly enough, is pleasantly low key and unassuming, yet totally ridiculous.
