Movie Review: Money Monster
May. 19th, 2016 06:19 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bedsitter23 Money Monster is one of the first great non-superhero non-franchise movies of the year, at least box office wise, but I wasn't exactly sure what to expect.
Given the cast (George Clooney, Julia Roberts) and given the topic (Occupy Wall Street/Feel the Burn righteous anger), it is easy to think this might be Oscar bait.
Indeed, the movie owes huge debts to Network and Dog Day Afternoon, movies we still talk about 40 years later.
It's unlikely we will be talking about this movie 40 weeks from now, but once it is established that this is going to be mindless action, then we can proceed. Indeed, if the marquee star was Jason Statham not Clooney, we wouldn't have even thought of that.
Indeed, there are many good things about this movie, and it might not have taken all that much to get to the next level.
Clooney plays an obvious ripoff of Jim Cramer's Mad Money stock analyst, though played up to Bulworth level ridiculous extremes.
Indeed, it is easy to see that the decisions the moviemakers make prevent it from being much more. Jack O'Connell's character essentially just walks in and holds up the show. It's impossible to think someone could just walk in and hold Cramer hostage in the post-9/11 age. There's a few ridiculous asides like the Viagra one. There's a great level of predictability in the plot and a lot of "coincidences" that get us to our conclusion, but don't feel "real" enough. I should also make mention that there is a great level of assembled talent (Giancarlo Esposito, Dominic West, Chris Bauer), but they could be filled by anyone. Only Clooney's character seems to have any level of depth.
So, that's the bad, but I am actually going to end up recommending it. Besides the predictability, there are moments where the film takes some turns that I thought worked well and did not expect.
Clooney is pretty good. Roberts is good. O'Connell may have shined had he been given more to work with.
I also think the real hero may be Jodie Foster as director, as I felt the pacing and suspense put it a notch ahead of similar movies. I have seen some complain of its short (94 min) running time, but I don't know if longer would have been better.
The platitudes are fairly general. i never did see The Big Short, but don't expect any kind of those type of revelations. Selfish CEOs are bad, although being greedy isn't necessarily against the law, and no one complains about selfish CEOs when everyone's making money, only when they lose it.
The bottom line is that there are more things that work in this movie than things that don't, and I suppose if you take an average action film and add Clooney and Foster, it's going to work. I liked it.
Given the cast (George Clooney, Julia Roberts) and given the topic (Occupy Wall Street/Feel the Burn righteous anger), it is easy to think this might be Oscar bait.
Indeed, the movie owes huge debts to Network and Dog Day Afternoon, movies we still talk about 40 years later.
It's unlikely we will be talking about this movie 40 weeks from now, but once it is established that this is going to be mindless action, then we can proceed. Indeed, if the marquee star was Jason Statham not Clooney, we wouldn't have even thought of that.
Indeed, there are many good things about this movie, and it might not have taken all that much to get to the next level.
Clooney plays an obvious ripoff of Jim Cramer's Mad Money stock analyst, though played up to Bulworth level ridiculous extremes.
Indeed, it is easy to see that the decisions the moviemakers make prevent it from being much more. Jack O'Connell's character essentially just walks in and holds up the show. It's impossible to think someone could just walk in and hold Cramer hostage in the post-9/11 age. There's a few ridiculous asides like the Viagra one. There's a great level of predictability in the plot and a lot of "coincidences" that get us to our conclusion, but don't feel "real" enough. I should also make mention that there is a great level of assembled talent (Giancarlo Esposito, Dominic West, Chris Bauer), but they could be filled by anyone. Only Clooney's character seems to have any level of depth.
So, that's the bad, but I am actually going to end up recommending it. Besides the predictability, there are moments where the film takes some turns that I thought worked well and did not expect.
Clooney is pretty good. Roberts is good. O'Connell may have shined had he been given more to work with.
I also think the real hero may be Jodie Foster as director, as I felt the pacing and suspense put it a notch ahead of similar movies. I have seen some complain of its short (94 min) running time, but I don't know if longer would have been better.
The platitudes are fairly general. i never did see The Big Short, but don't expect any kind of those type of revelations. Selfish CEOs are bad, although being greedy isn't necessarily against the law, and no one complains about selfish CEOs when everyone's making money, only when they lose it.
The bottom line is that there are more things that work in this movie than things that don't, and I suppose if you take an average action film and add Clooney and Foster, it's going to work. I liked it.
