The Contractor (2022) Review

Time: 103 Minutes
Cast:
Chris Pine as James Harper
Ben Foster as Mike Hawkins
Gillian Jacobs as Brianne Harper
Eddie Marsan as Virgil
J. D. Pardo as Eric
Kiefer Sutherland as Rusty Jennings
Florian Munteanu as Kauffman
Director: Tarik Saleh

Involuntarily discharged from the Army, a special forces sergeant lands a contract with a private underground military force. When his very first assignment goes awry, the elite soldier finds himself hunted and on the run, caught in a dangerous conspiracy and fighting to stay alive long enough to get home and uncover the true motives of those who betrayed him.

I saw The Contractor advertised on Amazon Prime, it looked to be a military thriller starring Chris Pine. Having watched it, it definitely felt like a streaming movie, but I was entertained nonetheless.

The script and story are fairly average; if you’ve seen a passable military action thriller (especially a streaming exclusive), then you’ve probably already seen The Contractor. The opening half hour is a bit slow, but it does well in setting up the lead character and showing why he decides to take on a particular job. It also has probably the only thing that distinguishes it from other movies of this genre, as it highlights how veterans are treated by the US military and attempts to tackle some issues about private military organisations. However, by the end it has forgotten about those and becomes another standard action movie. The story isn’t that interesting and is very predictable, not helped by the slogging pacing. The characters aren’t that developed and don’t have the emotional depth needed. I will say that I do appreciate how surprisingly solemn the tone was. Also, whereas a lot of these types of military movies put things on a large scale, The Contractor is comparatively small scale and mostly focuses on Chris Pine trying to survive. While I didn’t care for the story, it was okay enough that I was willing to pay attention to what was happening. The third act is fine and entertaining enough, but it felt like they ran out of ideas and needed to formulate some predictable climax. The ending itself also ends a bit too abruptly.

The cast are definitely the highlight of the movie. Chris Pine is very solid in the lead role, he carries much of the film. He certainly puts everything in this and helps to make his character feel more vulnerable and relatable. The rest of the cast deliver on their parts too. Ben Foster is quite good as well, even if he’s underutilised, and he and Pine (who co-starred in Hell or High Water) share convincing chemistry. Other actors like Gillian Jacobs, Eddie Marsan and Kiefer Sutherland also work in their screentime, but they are a little underserved. Gillian Jacobs is limited to just being ‘the wife character’, and Kiefer Sutherland’s villain (not much of a twist, it is easy to see coming) doesn’t get enough screentime to land an impression. Eddie Marsan’s scenes are some of the best scenes in the movie, but unfortunately he isn’t in the movie all that much.

Direction wise, The Contractor is competently made. The cinematography is very basic, but the locations are pretty good, especially in Berlin. The action is solid too, with the firefights and fighting scenes being handled well. The editing did take away from the action and they could’ve used less cuts, but I wouldn’t say its as bad as in some other action movies. These sequences aren’t anything you haven’t seen before, yet are nonetheless entertaining enough to watch. The score from Alex Belcher also works for the movie, albeit isn’t anything special.

Despite its potential, The Contractor is a generic and forgettable military action thriller, mostly let down by the average script. However, I did enjoy watching the movie; I liked the action and the cast are quite good, especially Chris Pine.

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The Punisher (2004) Review

Time: 124 Minutes
Age Rating:
Cast:
Thomas Jane as Frank Castle/Punisher
John Travolta as Howard Saint
Will Patton as Quentin Glass
Rebecca Romijn as Joan
Ben Foster as Spacker Dave
Roy Scheider as Frank Castle Sr.
Director: Jonathan Hensleigh

After his wife and family are murdered by a gang of ruthless criminals, special agent Frank Castle takes it upon himself to hunt down and punish the criminals responsible for his loss.

The Punisher has had many on-screen adaptations, I was only familiar with the Netflix version starring Jon Bernthal, as well as 2008’s Punisher: War Zone starring Ray Stevenson. There are also two other known adaptations of The Punisher, one in 1989 with Dolph Lundgren, and another in 2004 starring Thomas Jane. I heard mixed things about both, but nonetheless I decided to check out the latter, and I enjoyed it in spite of its flaws.

The first thing to note about The Punisher is that it was made in the earlier years of comic book movies, and was a Marvel movie before the MCU was a thing. It feels like a movie first, and a comic book movie second. That in itself is something to appreciate especially with the MCU today. If you went into this movie without knowing its comic book source, it would work perfectly fine as an action movie. That being said, one of the big issues is that the tone is all over the place with what its aiming to be, and it is a weird mix overall. A big aspect about The Punisher character is that he’s meant to show the dark side and consequences of being a vigilante, this movie skips that in favour for a revenge fantasy. Not to say that there aren’t attempts at showing depth, the initial tragedy that the protagonist experiences is treated very seriously. However it just doesn’t go deep enough it is clear that it is more focused on the revenge. It is indeed very dark (as were most comic book movies released in the 2000s), but some o the nihilism is played so straight that it become unintentionally funny. At the same time, a lot of the movie feels like its aiming to be throwback to the B-level revenge thrillers of the 70s, the source material seemed to be pulpy, and there’s plenty of moments throughout the film where it goes for that. It also has goofy dialogue and one liners alongside the brutal violence. However, it even suffers as a revenge thriller, especially with how cliched and routine it feels. Another thing holding this movie back is that whatever way you’re reading the movie, the story is a bit dull. The overall length is over 2 hours and it’s a bit too long for this movie. The story and characters aren’t that interesting or given enough depth, so there are moments where you are just waiting for the action to appear again.

Thomas Jane is the thing most remembered about this movie, as he plays Frank Castle/The Punisher. I still prefer Jon Bernthal’s version of the character, but Jane is good here and one of the highlights of the movie. We see Castle start off fairly light hearted towards the beginning, and then becoming cold and calculating when he becomes the Punisher. That being said, I feel like he doesn’t get much chance to show his Punisher off. The character isn’t that interesting here, and he doesn’t have much personality outside of brooding and seeking revenge. Still, Jane plays his part well. Something that would keep the movie exciting is by having the Punisher go up against an over the top and memorable villain. The main antagonist in this movie is Howard Saint, a mobster who is responsible for the death of Frank Castle’s family, and he is played by John Travolta. However, this character and performance are the most disappointing parts of the whole movie. You’ve seen this type of mobster villain in plenty of other action movies and nothing about this version is remarkable. The idea of Travolta playing him had potential, and had he brought some of his manic energy from his previous on screen villains like in Face/Off or Broken Arrow, it would’ve really made the movie more fun to watch. Weirdly though, Travolta plays things so straight to the point of it being emotionless and dull, and he doesn’t even succeed in being convincingly menacing. There are some other actors who are generally good, including Laura Harring, Ben Foster, Rebecca Romijn and Roy Scheider, with Will Patton as Travolta’s henchman being the standout.

This is Jonathan Hensleigh’s first movie, and while his directing can be a bit of a mixed bag, it is a decent debut. On a technical level it is solid, if unremarkable. While the editing can be a bit shaky, on the whole there are some good action scenes. This is definitely an R rated movie, and that works to its advantage. This is a very violent Punisher movie, and they definitely deliver on the brutality. In some ways it feels like the R rated action movies of the 90s, and if that’s what they were going for, they succeeded.

2004’s The Punisher is far from being one of the best comic book movies or one of the best adaptations of the character. The writing is unremarkable, the story is dull, and the tone is confused. However, I still enjoyed it; I appreciated the different tone compared to the comic book movies of today, the action is entertaining, and Thomas Jane is pretty good as The Punisher. It’s an above average action thriller which is mostly forgettable, but I’m glad I saw it.

Ain’t Them Bodies Saints (2013) Review

Time: 126 Minutes
Age Rating:
Cast:
Rooney Mara as Ruth Guthrie
Casey Affleck as Bob Muldoon
Ben Foster as Patrick Wheeler
Keith Carradine as Skerritt
Rami Malek as Will
Charles Baker as Bear
Nate Parker as Sweetie
Director: David Lowery

A man (Casey Affleck) takes the fall for his lover’s (Rooney Mara) crime, then four years later breaks out of prison to find her and their young daughter, who was born during his incarceration.

I was initially interested in Ain’t Them Bodies Saints for the talent involved, especially with a cast that included Rooney Mara. I went in knowing nothing aside from this and the initial premise, and I quite liked it, even if the writing wasn’t anything special.

At its core, Ain’t Them Bodies Saints is a poetic and melancholic crime drama. The story is predictable, simple and a bit cliched, the characters are archetypical and nothing special. Its very loose with the plot, and for the most part it doesn’t really land as hard emotionally as it was intending to. It is a slower paced movie, often meandering and particularly dragging in the second act. Not everything is explained, and much is left up for the viewer to interpret, very much high on atmosphere and low on explanation, but I kind of respect that. There is a melancholic and sad vibe that is effectively conveyed throughout. There is very little time spent on the actual romance between the lead two characters; we get early scenes with the couple together before they are separated and then there’s a time jump. After this point, for most of the runtime, they aren’t on screen together. Instead, much of the film is them yearning for each other and I thought that was effective. While the movie on the whole doesn’t succeed entirely, there are some powerful character moments.

Much of what made the movie work as well as it did was the cast. Casey Affleck and Rooney Mara deliver great and powerful performances as their characters, they shared convincing chemistry together, which is important since much of the movie relies on their connection, and they have limited scenes together. Ben Foster, Keith Carradine and more also worked well in supporting parts.

David Lowery’s direction was one of the strongest elements of the movie, I liked his style and handling of the movie. This film is beautifully shot by Bradford Young, with great use of natural lighting and really captured the locations and settings. There is also a great score from Daniel Hart which fitted the melancholic tone of the movie. Ain’t Them Bodies Saints really reminded me of Terrence Malick’s earlier movies, especially with the cinematography and locations, along with the fairly plotless approach.

Ain’t Them Bodies Saints is a good romantic crime drama. I wouldn’t say that it is a must see, it is slower paced, it can drag and feels like it is missing something with the writing and story. However, David Lowery’s direction and the solid performances were just enough to make it work, and I think it is worth checking out.

Leave No Trace (2018) Review

Time: 109 Minutes
Age Rating: Drug references
Cast:
Ben Foster as Will
Thomasin McKenzie as Tom
Jeff Kober as Mr. Walters
Dale Dickey as Dale
Director: Debra Granik

A father (Ben Foster) and daughter (Thomasin McKenzie) live a perfect but mysterious existence in Forest Park, a beautiful nature reserve near Portland, Oregon, rarely making contact with the world. But when a small mistake tips them off to authorities, they are sent on an increasingly erratic journey in search of a place to call their own.

I had heard about Leave No Trace a little bit before watching it, it had been getting some pretty good reception and had Ben Foster in it, but outside of that didn’t know much about it, I didn’t even really know what the actual premise of the whole movie was. While I don’t love the movie as much as other people, I do think that it’s pretty good, and the lead performances are nothing short of fantastic.

The story of Leave No Trace isn’t exactly given a particular structure or necessarily leading to something (outside of the ending), it’s more so just following the two lead characters for 110 minutes. I did find the movie to drag a bit but I’ll admit that I was in a tired mood when watching it, and that probably negatively affected my experience with the movie. It is definitely a slow burn movie, so you have to be in the mood to watch it. I will say though that I was expecting more from the movie though once I got a general idea about what the movie was about. For example a part of the movie is that Ben Foster’s father character has PTSD, which clearly has made an impact on him and the decisions that he makes. However the film don’t really touch upon it as much as they could’ve, like it’s stated that he has PTSD and that’s it, they don’t address it outside of that. Leave No Trace is definitely going for a more quieter storytelling method, and for the most part it works well enough. However I think that more dialogue between the father and daughter characters would’ve allowed us to learn about these characters more and therefore care more about what happens with them. I will say though that the ending of the movie is really good.

The main reason to watch this movie is for the performances by Ben Foster and Thomasin McKenzie, their characters and their father/daughter connection are what hold the movie together. They are very subtle and feel real in their performances, McKenzie is particularly great. This movie was basically relying on them being great, and it wouldn’t have worked at all without them, thankfully they were more than up for the task. As mentioned earlier, giving more dialogue between these characters would’ve made us care about them more, but their performances does elevate them above the material that they have.

This film was directed by Debra Granik (who directed Winter’s Bone, a movie I haven’t seen but heard is pretty good) and the whole movie was very directed well overall. Whenever it goes into forest locations, it really does feel like it’s deep in the forest, with the cinematography being fantastic. Granik also keeps the film throughout pretty low key and grounded, there aren’t any large, loud or flashy moments that are out of place at all, which works well with the type of story that she’s going for.

Leave No Trace is a solid film, with good direction and great performances. You definitely need to be in the mood to watch it, it is a slow burn film just following two characters and you need to know that going in. However it still is worth watching, at the very least for the performances of Ben Foster and Thomasin McKenzie.

Inferno (2016) Review

Time: 121 Minutes
Age Rating: Violence
Cast:
Tom Hanks as Dr. Robert Langdon
Felicity Jones as Dr. Sienna Brooks
Omar Sy as Christoph Bouchard
Ben Foster as Bertrand Zobrist
Sidse Babett Knudsen as Elizabeth Sinskey
Irrfan Khan as Harry “The Provost” Sims
Ana Ularu as Vayentha
Director: Ron Howard

Famous symbologist Robert Langdon (Tom Hanks) follows a trail of clues tied to Dante, the great medieval poet. When Langdon wakes up in an Italian hospital with amnesia, he teams up with Sienna Brooks (Felicity Jones), a doctor he hopes will help him recover his memories. Together, they race across Europe and against the clock to stop a madman (Ben Foster) from unleashing a virus that could wipe out half of the world’s population.

The Da Vinci Code/Robert Langdon movie series were pretty good, they weren’t by any means great, but they were enjoyable mystery stories. 7 years after the last movie, Angels and Demons, there is another instalment that I’m not sure even the die hard Da Vinci Code fans were asking for with Inferno. Inferno is such a massive step down from the previous films. Despite Ron Howard returning to direct along with talent like Felicity Jones and Irrfan Khan involved, this film just isn’t good. It’s not one of the worst movies ever but it is incredibly mediocre.

The story is incredibly forgettable. I’ll admit, I can’t even remember what this movie is completely about. I found it so difficult to care about what was going on. I didn’t care about the story, I didn’t care about the characters, I wasn’t really that interested in what was going on. Honestly I don’t think I can comment about the actual story as I wasn’t paying that close attention but it really says something when I’m so not invested in this movie, and I was trying really hard to focus on it. I haven’t read any of the Robert Langdon books and I haven’t read Inferno so I don’t know if there had been any changes or not but either way, I didn’t care much for the story. From start to finish its on a constant unwavering line of meh.

Tom Hanks returns as Robert Langdon and you can definitely tell that he is trying his best here. The problem is that his character operates heavily using his brain as shown in the previous movies. Robert in this movie has amnesia and we don’t get to see what he’s like before the amnesia, so it feels like a completely different character. And no, we don’t get to see much characterisation for Langdon in this movie. Credit to Hanks for trying his best. Other actors like Felicity Jones, Ben Foster and Omar Sy do a decent job with what they have but aren’t used to their fullest potential and aren’t enough to elevate the quality of this movie. The one actor who seemed to effortlessly steal the show was Irrfan Khan but unfortunately he didn’t play that big of a role. He definitely elevates this movie however.

I cannot believe that Ron Howard directed this, he’s done so much better than this. At times the direction is basic and serviceable enough and at other points it feels like an amateur filmmaker tried to make a movie but failing miserably. The dream sequences are done terribly, during these scenes it looks like a made for tv movie with awful CGI. So not even Ron Howard’s direction can improve this movie.

Although it had some potential, Inferno is just not a good movie. Despite some talented people involved, for some reason it just didn’t come together to actually work. The best part of this movie is the performances, and even then its only really Irrfan Khan who shines. I guess if you’re curious enough you can check it out but don’t expect something that great. It’s not terrible, just quite underwhelming and mediocre, there’s not much to really say about it to be honest.