Strarts strong but becomes a mess...

Rating: 7/10 (6 January 2015)

This film is an impressionist painting half covered with a Jackson Pollock!
I was really looking forward to see this one for two reasons: Tatum and Carell. Given the director was Bennett Miller, who already proved to be good and skillful at sport-drama with Moneyball, I thought there could be no problem.
I was wrong.
The first half of the film is impeccable, both directing and acting are good to watch. Tatum is a stunner, he amazed me. Ruffalo is perfect as usual, and this mentor/wise-older brother image fits him wonderfully. The scenes are powerful and are created with such a telling style, it is a directorial triumph. This is due to the ability to tastefully depict the a story of three man, with very few words but strong images.
This was the impressionist part now let's see the Pollock side of the picture.
Both the writer and the director loses it, for no reason, they were on a great track, but I guess they (chiefly the writer) had no idea how to get elegantly to the endpoint of the story.
At the middle of the film, it becomes a mess! It gives you nothing, but DEMANDS you to keep on looking at it in awe, even though it is simply not entertaining or any good anymore. Motives become secondary, characters only do things because they have to, so everything goes as the writer and the non-fictional story parts demand it, nothing is at stake because we know that David Schultz gets shot in the end... The complexity and cogency ceases to exist.
Carell is a bit of a disappointment for me, he pulls it off but does not succeed. But I don't blame him. He has no room to act, the director doesn't have any idea how to bring the DuPont out of the actor. He is poorly instructed. Almost no resemblance to the real man, except the broken speaking pattern. Why add 30kgs on Carell, when the guy was sickly skinny? Why make him having the same emotionless face all along, when DuPont rather acted as a schizophrenic, than a robot!? It was supposed to be Carell's big moment, but Tatum triumphed... Thank you Bennett...
I gave it 7 only for the first 60 minutes and Ruffalo & Tatum! Deserves worse! Hope, Carell gets another chance for a big drama role sometime soon!