Good and Dark

Rating: Null/10 (7 September 2011)

Depp and Cruz continue to show expansive range, in this dark and tragic biopic of cocaine mogul George Jung. The varied pacing gives them plenty of room -- slow enough to tell a rich cautionary tale with intriguing characters, but with page-turner excitement. Cruz's entrance in the last half of the movie, is like introducing the smoldering hot sun itself! She effortlessly heats up everything, captures and enthralls. (Seems like her character could have been brought in sooner and drawn with much more nuance.)
Ray Liotta struggles a bit to give depth to his weakly written role as George's loving, understanding but ultimately weak and enabling father. He's hurt by the script and possibly inadequate direction. (Actually several scenes seem to suffer from inauthentic writing, producing an unintended discomfort rather than the intended emotions of pain and sadness over human failure.) Still, Liotta pulls off a believable and warm performance.
This is an engaging movie that just doesn't use its actors' gifts fully. I felt like it was played unnecessarily safe at times, but it might be difficult to go with full-on drama when trying to show some faithfulness to a real-life story. Sometimes, you can get it correct, without getting it right.
Men might enjoy Blow more than women, as it's told from the perspective of a man trying hard to honor his father but also surpass him in business. The female characters are included only to the extent they illustrate Jung's quest.
Ambivalence notwithstanding: This is a more-than-decent way to spend a couple of hours. Depp and Cruz can almost always be trusted to be fun and interesting to watch, and Blow is no exception.