nihilistic escapism

Rating: Null/10 (5 January 2008)

Marred only by the fashionably nihilistic stated theme, the movie is fun to watch when it has momentum and also tense when it wants to be. But a grandmother character sticks out like a broken bone among an otherwise great cast as indirect as the screenplay tries to be with exposition it sounds ham-fisted in its attempts to prove the crazy hit-man baddie's world view correct. It will be called a "smart man's thriller" but it still has moments where the audience may be brighter than the protagonist and a tracking device premise that we have already seen easily defeated in The Da Vinci Code. So much for playing superior, Coens. The movie is at its best in silent stretches, though tolerable when reflective. Based on a novel or not, for me it is the movie where Two-Face/Harvey Dent Tommy Lee Jones from Batman Forever is trying to track down a baddie who has the same quirk of coin-flipping to determine one's fate. It occurs to me that we give a bad guy more slack; he can be a superhuman Rambo figure sewing himself up and evading the worst you can dish out as long as he makes matters worse. It's not pandering to wish fulfillment fantasies, unless your wish is to steer clear of happy endings. Is there any such thing as a spoiler if the ending is a downer? I say no, but I've left out the details just in case.