saw The Heat, a female-centric action comedy about an overly confident and professional FBI agent and an unconventional loose cannon Boston detective teaming up to take down a drug cartel leader and, just like director Paul Feigs last film, the super successful Bridesmaids, he just cant recommend it. Its a close call, for sure, as, it starts out really swift, subversive, funny and interesting and Sandra Bullock and Melissa McCarthy have good chemistry together and their performances do a good job of both transcending the formula characters they inhabit and keeping them from feeling repetitive and inauthentic. Also, this movie is far better paced than Bridesmaids (read; its not so aggravatingly in love with every single attempt at humor it makes), but, just like Bridesmaids, it kind of sags the longer it goes on as it loses its edge and makes the cliched developments and situations that come from this well-established formula still feel like an example of the movie taking the easy way out, instead of being consistent with its earlier attempts to skewer the familiar elements. Also, the films tone becomes uneven later on, leading to an uncomfortable, unmotivated and unprepared for mixture of harrowing violence with dark comedy that doesnt work and, in one case, is a straight steal from the similar and far better 21 Jump Street (his 10th best film of 2012). He cant be too harsh on this one, but given how it was on the right track for a while, its too bad it couldnt bring it all home in the end, but that, and its unexpected box office success, are what sequels are for, he hopes; 2 1/2 stars.
Posted on: Sat, 01 Feb 2014 18:02:29 +0000
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