I went and saw The Counselor today and it carries to distinctions: One its the first original screenplay from Cormac McCarthy (No Country for Old Men, The Road) who is considered to be one of Americas greatest living novelists; and it is one of the very few movies that I can honestly say there isnt a SINGLE thing I liked about it. It stars Michael Fassbinder (Inglorious Basterds, Promethius) as a lawyer who is never named he is simply called Counselor by everybody who somehow gets involved in a drug deal that goes bad. Now when I say somehow Im not being secretive about plot details I honestly do NOT know what his role in the deal is. He literally takes no action regarding anything the entire film. All he does he meet with his friend Reiner (Javier Bardem) who is connected to the cartel and Brad Pitt who plays a middle man. The other two prominent characters are Penelope Cruz as Fassbinders fiance and Cameron Diaz as Bardems lover. Again all the Counselor does is meet with Pitt who has monologues about the meaning of the word cautionary and snuff films and Bardem who has kind of spikey hair, wears colorful clothing and has two cheetahs as pets. Cruz is absent for long periods of time then comes on to look lovingly at Fassbinder, Diaz has more screentime but doesnt do anything particularly interesting either. Wait scratch that there IS a scene on a hood of a Ferrari but this is a family friendly post so I shant be going into detail. This brings me to Mr. McCormacs screenplay as I said he is considered one of our greatest authors and he is a Pulitizer Prize winner for The Road but I have to say I dont get it. To be fair I havent actually read his work only seen adaptions of The Road, No Country, and an adaption of a play he wrote called The Sunset Limited which was a HBO movie starring Tommy Lee Jones and Samuel L. Jackson and aside from The Road, I havent liked any of it. He seems less interested in characters as people and more as ideas and symbols. Like the character of Anton Chigurah (played by Bardem) in No Country who represented pure nihilism. Although I wasnt a fan of that movie either but that worked with that character here it doesnt work at all (if indeed that is what he is going for) because nobody does anything except spout monologues that are instantly forgettable because they sound like written dialogue and nothing a real live flesh and blood person would actually say. The monotony is broken up with scenes of brutal violence and the running time is padded by scenes with people we only see one time that add nothing to the plot such as it is. This is a movie that has a lot of talent both in front of the camera and behind it was directed by Ridley Scott (Gladiator, Prometheus) but it adds up to nothing. I will amend something I said in the beginning of this post there is one thing I did like. The part where the scene went black after the final scene ended and the final credits started rolling so I could get up and leave; I LOVED that part. My score: F
Posted on: Sat, 26 Oct 2013 22:04:03 +0000
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