Most Likely to Murder (2018)

19 Sunday Aug 2018

Tags

Adam Pally, Comedy, Crime, Dan Gregor, Doug Mand, Evidence, Murder mystery, Pharmacist, Rachel Bloom, Review, Suspect, Vincent Kartheiser

D: Dan Gregor / 99m

Cast: Adam Pally, Rachel Bloom, Vincent Kartheiser, Doug Mand, John Reynolds, Didi Conn, Ethan Phillips, Julia Goldani Telles, Rebecca Naomi Jones, Bonnie Rose

Billy (Pally), the one-time king of his local high school, is now, ten years later, working at a dead-end job in a Las Vegas hotel. Deciding it’s time for a holiday, he returns home to his parents (Conn, Phillips), but makes out he’s successful and on the verge of completing a major deal. Billy reconnects with his old friend, Duane (Mand), but finds that most everyone else in town isn’t as pleased to see him back, including old flame, Kara (Bloom). Billy left her behind to go to Las Vegas; now she’s dating Billy’s neighbour and town pharmacist, Lowell (Kartheiser). When Lowell’s mother dies suddenly, Billy becomes suspicious when he realises that Lowell has lied to the police. Convinced that Lowell is a killer, Billy sets about gathering evidence, and even voices his suspicions to Lieutenant Perkins (Reynolds). But with everyone believing Lowell to be a pillar of the community, and unable to produce clear evidence that Lowell has killed his mother, Billy decides to return to Las Vegas. Until Kara notices something strange about the pharmacy inventory…

A valiant attempt to combine comedy with a murder mystery, Most Likely to Murder is the kind of eccentric mash-up that needs to be on its toes with both aspects of its construction. It’s moderately successful on both counts, but makes mistakes along the way that could have been easily avoided. First is Billy himself, a self-aggrandising, arrogant, insensitive jerk whose character arc is non-existent until the very end when the script – previously uninterested in giving him any redeeming features – gets him to do an abrupt volte face and reveal a previously well hidden (if not absent) conscience. The second is the mystery itself, which, though the movie has a great deal of fun with the whole did-he-didn’t-he? angle, is too laboured and predictable to work as effectively as needed, and keen-eyed fans of murder mysteries will correctly guess the outcome well in advance of the movie revealing it. So, as a result, the movie has a lead character who’s immediately unlikeable and behaves inappropriately because it drives most of the comedy, and a murder mystery that is dependent on making the main suspect as guilty looking as possible but only because, in Billy’s eyes, he’s a “bit weird”.

There are moments when the script – by co-star Mand and director Gregor – contorts itself in its efforts to keep things moving, and the movie’s pace dips when it has to choose between being funny or serious. This leads to odd moments such as Billy’s brief “interaction” with Duane’s mother (Rose), a bathroom “reveal” that defies the belief that “Lowell has no pole”, and a running joke involving a VHS tape of Billy and Lt. Perkins’ wife (Jones) from high school that everyone wants to see. Against the odds, the performances make things far more enjoyable than the script allows for, with Pally embracing Billy’s faults in a way that, while not making him sympathetic, does at least allow the viewer to understand him. There’s good support from Bloom and Mand, and Reynolds finds different ways to play henpecked and exasperated without it feeling forced, but if anyone has a hard time, it’s Kartheiser, who has to deal with the script’s determination to make Lowell as weird as possible to fit Billy’s suspicions. He does what he can but there are clear moments when the actor is struggling to keep his performance on track. By the end, you’ll know if he’s succeeded, but before then, this is a movie that doesn’t make it easy for the viewer to remain entirely interested in Billy’s search for the truth.

Rating: 5/10 – moderately funny with a moderately interesting murder mystery, Most Likely to Murder will exasperate some viewers while proving moderately entertaining to others; the kind of movie that comes and goes with little fanfare, it’s worth checking out if you’re in an undemanding mood, but anyone looking for something with a bit more substance would be wise to look elsewhere.

Monthly Roundup – May 2015

31 Sunday May 2015

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

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Tags

Antonio Banderas, Art heist, Artificial intelligence, Ballard Berkeley, Bat Masterson, Berlin, Boston, Bullying, Burger Beard, Chappie, Christopher Plummer, Clancy Brown, Comet, Conrad Phillips, Crime, Dave Franco, Dead body, Drama, Emmy Rossum, Eric Stonestreet, Father/son relationship, Frank R. Strayer, Gay bar, George Pastell, Glory holes, Hugh Jackman, Impact, Irene Ware, James Marsden, Joel McCrea, John Miljan, John Travolta, Joseph M. Newman, Julie Adams, Justin Long, Karl Urban, Ken Scott, Krabby Patty formula, Matthias Schoenaerts, Monthly roundup, Murder at Glen Athol, Murder mystery, Neill Blomkamp, Peter Maxwell, Philip Martin, Plankton, Review, Romance, Sam Esmail, Sharlto Copley, Sienna Miller, SpongeBob Squarepants, Swarf, The Duke, The Forger, The Gunfight at Dodge City, The Loft, The Spongebob Movie: Sponge Out of Water, Thriller, Tom Denny, Tom Wilkinson, Tye Sheridan, Unfinished Business, Vince Vaughn, Wentworth Miller, Western

There’s a phrase that everyone will be familiar with: “Too many [insert item here], too little time”. When it comes to the number of movies that I watch in any given month, that phrase is apt in relation to the ones that get reviewed here on thedullwoodexperiment. I would love to have the time to post reviews of all the movies I see, but it’s just not practical; and besides which, some movies just don’t merit the attention (Annabelle (2014), for instance). Sometimes it’s a case of choosing one movie over another, sometimes Life gets in the way of blogging and a movie falls by the wayside. To combat this, and to give these “other” movies their due, I’ve decided to present, at the end of each month, a brief “review” of all the other movies I’ve seen. There won’t be any synopsis, or proper full-length analysis, just the title, director, running time, cast, and then the traditional two sentence ratings summation. So, let’s see which movies didn’t quite make the cut in May 2015.

The Forger (2014) / D: Philip Martin / 96m

Cast: John Travolta, Christopher Plummer, Tye Sheridan, Abigail Spencer, Anson Mount, Marcus Thomas, Jennifer Ehle, Travis Aaron Wade

Rating: 5/10 – Travolta’s art forger comes out of prison to spend time with his dying son (Sheridan) and pull off an audacious robbery; a derivative, occasionally unappealing crime drama that tries to do something different with its dying child angle, The Forger is nevertheless a movie whose “one last heist” scenario has been done to death elsewhere, and with far better results.

The Gunfight at Dodge City (1959) / D: Joseph M. Newman / 81m

Cast: Joel McCrea, Julie Adams, John McIntire, Nancy Gates, Richard Anderson, James Westerfield, Walter Coy, Don Haggerty, Wright King, Harry Lauter

Rating: 6/10 – Western legend Bat Masterson (McCrea) tackles corruption supported by Haggerty’s devious sheriff in Dodge City and faces romantic problems as well from minister’s daughter Adams and saloon owner Gates; a middling, mildly diverting Western, The Gunfight at Dodge City benefits from McCrea’s solid, no-nonsense performance and Newman’s underrated abilities behind the camera.

Comet (2014) / D: Sam Esmail / 91m

Cast: Justin Long, Emmy Rossum

Rating: 7/10 – Long and Rossum are the soulmates whose on-again-off-again relationship is examined over the course of six years; with the narrative continually fractured and reassembled, Comet is replete with the kind of “serious” romantic musings that sound alternately pretentious and profound, but the two leads have a definite chemistry and this helps immensely in making the movie as enjoyable as it (largely) is.

Murder at Glen Athol (1936) / D: Frank R. Strayer / 67m

Cast: John Miljan, Irene Ware, Iris Adrian, Noel Madison, Oscar Apfel, Barry Norton, Harry Holman, Betty Blythe, James P. Burtis

Rating: 5/10 – two murders and a dying confession confuse matters for a detective (Miljan) who’s just trying to take a vacation – next door to where the murders have taken place; packed full of seemingly endless exposition and no shortage of suspects, Murder at Glen Athol is a sprightly murder mystery that packs a lot in but not always to its best advantage.

The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge Out of Water (2015) / D: Paul Tibbitt / 92m

Cast: Antonio Banderas, Tom Kenny, Clancy Brown, Bill Fagerbakke, Rodger Bumpass, Mr. Lawrence, Carolyn Lawrence

Rating: 7/10 – when the formula for Krabby Patty is stolen by the notorious Burger Beard (Banderas), SpongeBob (Kenny) is forced to team up with Plankton (Mr. Lawrence) to get it back… and venture above the surface; freewheeling fun with the denizens of Bikini Bottom that features lots of gags and the usual bright visuals, but takes an awfully long time in getting to the “sponge out of water” part.

Chappie (2015) / D: Neill Blomkamp / 120m

Cast: Sharlto Copley, Dev Patel, Hugh Jackman, Ninja, Yo-Landi Visser, Jose Pablo Cantillo, Sigourney Weaver, Brandon Auret, Johnny Selema

Rating: 6/10 – with a robot police force firmly established in Johannesburg, the introduction of artificial intelligence leads to one robot, named Chappie, learning what it’s like to be human; disappointing outing from Blomkamp that never quite gels or seems sure of what it’s trying to do or say, but does feature an excellent performance from Copley.

Impact (1963) / D: Peter Maxwell / 61m

Cast: Conrad Phillips, George Pastell, Ballard Berkeley, Linda Marlowe, Richard Klee, Anita West, John Rees

Rating: 5/10 – when newspaper reporter Jack Moir (Phillips) is framed for robbery by arch-nemesis “The Duke” (Pastell), he swears to get even when he gets out of jail; a low-key crime drama that seems busier than it is and which gets bogged down in the mechanics of Moir’s revenge plot, Impact does allow for a welcome appearance by Berkeley aka Fawlty Towers‘ Major, and an above average performance by Pastell.

The Loft (2014) / D: Erik Van Looy / 103m

Cast: Karl Urban, James Marsden, Wentworth Miller, Eric Stonestreet, Matthias Schoenaerts, Isabel Lucas, Rachael Taylor, Rhona Mitra, Valerie Cruz, Kali Rocha, Elaine Cassidy, Margarita Levieva, Kristin Lehman, Robert Wisdom

Rating: 6/10 – the discovery of a woman’s dead body in the loft apartment shared by five married men for their secret liaisons prompts them to suspect each other of the crime; alternately gripping and implausible, The Loft is a modern day cautionary tale that loses credibility with its solution then recovers with a great twist, but still has the air of a thriller that its writer never quite got to grips with.

Unfinished Business (2015) / D: Ken Scott / 91m

Cast: Vince Vaughn, Tom Wilkinson, Dave Franco, Sienna Miller, Nick Frost, James Marsden, June Diane Raphael, Britton Sear, Ella Anderson, Uwe Ochsenknecht

Rating: 5/10 – Swarf salesman Dan Trunkman (Vaughn) has to overcome all sorts of obstacles to land the contract that will save his fledgling company from going under, including a visit to a Berlin gay bar; a bit of a strange fish, Unfinished Business suffers from being two separate movies joined at the hip: one a raucous comedy, the other a thoughtful study of bullying, but together they don’t make for a cohesive whole, and it’s yet another movie where Vaughn coasts along on former glories.

Removal (2010)

25 Tuesday Feb 2014

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

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Tags

Billy Burke, Mark Kelly, Murder mystery, Nick Simon, Oz Perkins, Review, Thriller

D: Nick Simon / 91m

Cast: Billy Burke, Mark Kelly, Oz Perkins, Kelly Brook, Emma Caulfield, Elliott Gould, Sharon Omi

At the end of his work day, contract cleaner Cole (Kelly) is persuaded to visit a potential client, Sharpe (Perkins) and provide him with an estimate for the work he requires. When Cole arrives he finds himself bullied into taking on the job, cleaning a very large mansion, that same night. He also begins to suspect that Sharpe has killed his wife and child and that their bodies might still be in the property. As he becomes increasingly convinced of their demise, so begins a deadly game of cat-and-mouse with Sharpe, a game that quickly escalates into something both unexpected and much grimmer. And to complicate matters, Cole has a secret of his own…

An uneasy, well-directed thriller, Removal has an edgy, almost hallucinatory quality from the off that helps keep the viewer wrong-footed as the plot advances from its standard everyman thrust into uncharted territory beginning, to its clever denouement. Set largely within the confines of Sharpe’s mansion, the movie prowls the empty rooms and corridors along with the increasingly suspicious Cole, and as the viewer is drawn into the mystery of whether or not Sharpe has killed his family, two things become evident: that Removal will confound expectations, and that it will prove to be a worthwhile viewing experience. Much of the storyline is overwhelmingly familiar but in the hands of writer/director Simon and his co-writers Daniel Meersand and Oz Perkins, the familiarity is overlaid with a disconcerting sense that, at any moment, the rug is going to be pulled out from under the viewer’s feet. And so it proves: two thirds of the way in, the game changes, and it’s a tribute to the creative minds behind Removal – not to mention the committed cast – that it works as well as it does.

As the main protagonist, Cole, Kelly imbues his character with a measured hang-dog quality, his personal circumstances dictating the ease with which Sharpe manipulates him. Kelly is never less than believable throughout, and is matched by Perkins (son of Anthony). Sharpe is an arrogant bully, judgmental and quick to undermine Cole’s already fragile self-esteem. Perkins plays him with a steely disdain for those he perceives as weaker than himself, and yet he still possesses an off-kilter charm. Burke acquits himself well, too, despite having less screen time, as an acquaintance of Cole’s, Eric, who finds himself drawn into the mystery. In smaller roles, Caulfield as Cole’s wife, and Brook as an unlikely estate agent, make an impression, but the one disappointment is Gould: his lines are delivered with all the enthusiasm of someone awaiting root canal treatment.

There’s atmospheric photography courtesy of Kevin Duggin, and a complementary score provided by Nima Fakhrara. On the negative side, the movie relies a little too much on its game changer to facilitate its ending, and while there is a logical outcome to events, the movie places Cole and Eric in a potentially never-ending situation that could presage a sequel at some point – but which would be unnecessary – and spoils the effect of what has gone before. However, it’s easy to see why the filmmakers went with the idea.

Rating: 7/10 – an old-fashioned has-he-dunnit tricked out with a more modern sensibility, Removal rewards the viewer by not “talking down” to them; intelligent and very well crafted.