I am kicking myself for not seeing this film the year it was released (I caught it last night on Cinemax). It would definitely have made my Top Ten. It is an evocative, moody period piece that takes its place alongside other notable 'modern' Westerns that revitalized the genre: from Unforgiven to Deadwood. My one sentence synopsis would be "Deadwood, starring Brad Pitt!"
I don't mean that as a slight, either. Brad Pitt is amazing as the iconic Jesse James--another tormented anti-hero who has reached a level of notoriety where he mistrusts everyone. (If it reminds you of Keith Carradine's excellent turn as Wild Bill Hickock in Deadwood, it should: the movie captures the same zeitgeist perfectly). Also like that HBO series, the film's supporting cast is without flaw -- a who's who of indie character actors: starting with memorable Deadwood alum Garret Dillahunt; Sam Rockwell (Choke); Paul Schneider (Lars & the Real Girl); a sadly-wasted Mary Louise Parker as Mrs. Jesse James; and Sam Shepard in a cameo as older brother Frank.
It is a shame Casey Affleck turned in his performance of a lifetime the same year as Javier Bardem's Anton Chigura in No Country: he inhabits the character even more than he did in his other breakthrough performance in last year's Gone Baby Gone. And kudos to the director, an obscure New Zealander who brought Eric Bana to these shores in Chopper. I wish I had been on board this movie from the start.
For every Big Lebowski there has to be a Barton Fink.
That is the immutable rule of the Coen Brothers comic universe: you stomach the bad (Fink) in anticipation of the classic (Lebowski). For one Raising Arizona, Hudsucker Proxy, Fargo, and O Brother, Where Art Thou?, you have to sit through the dreck of The Ladykillers and Burn Without Reading. In spite of its A-list cast (George Clooney and Frances McDormand are comic masters--Tilda Swinton cannot do much with a one-note role), Burn is just that: another mean-spirited look at a collection of losers who are not so much funny as pathetic. That doesn't stop the Coens from holding them up to ridicule and then pulling the rug out from under the audience for sympathizing with them.
For a supposed comedy, I didn't laugh out loud once until the very end of the movie, where character-actor par excellence J.K. Simmons delivers some hilarious lines at CIA headquarters. That and the authentic DC locales (where I used to jog in George Clooney's footsteps! ... or his in mine, more accurately) are the only redeemable features.
But this post is about Brad Pitt, so I have to comment on his performance. I took alot of heat in some quarters for saying this about a long-forgotten Matt Dillon role, but I think it applies even more to Mr. Pitt: He is too smart an actor to play dumb. He is!! He doesn't give a bad performance so much as an unconvincing one (like he's trying too hard). I can only hope he proves my point with an award-worthy performance in the much-anticipated Benjamin Button.
Honestly, doesn't he strike a more iconic, larger than life, movie star pose in the picture at the left than the one on the right? (I'm just saying .... )
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