Loved it. Christian Bale and Russell Crowe are uniformly excellent. The standout is Wild Assed Ben Foster, whose performance as the “I am utterly devoted to my boss who is secretly a homophobic asshole” Charlie Prince has to be seen to be believed. Intelligent, easily offended and crazier than a meth lab rat, his character is one of those “Yeah, those guys can act but I got the part of a lifetime and I’m chewing scenery with ruminant thoroughness and raptor speed” delineations that will never even make the list for best supporting, and will still have the power to crack people up 20 years from now.
I am assuming that director James Mangold had pretty much total control in terms of the casting. Oh, what a great sociopath Russell Crowe as Ben Wade makes. Slimy, charming even when you KNOW that’s he pulling it out for you, possessing lightning fast reflexes, an exceedingly well trained horse, the ability to immediately zero in on the most important part of the environment including sex when it affords itself, he has a lethally committed second in command and not a care in the world but the next theft. And he’s ‘artistic’ don’t you know, he does heartfelt but not particularly skilled pencil sketches, and you see him first gazing upon a bird of prey. Oh, wow! Sub – til.
I have to go to bed. Oh, Alan Tudyk plays the doctor. Except he’s a vet.
I wish I’d seen the movie with Keith – we were both there but missed each other and Keith went home without seeing the movie.
I looked this movie up on the web. Allegra, you are so ahead of Ottawa. The first showing of this movie within 40 miles of our house is not until tomorrow, BUT it has your review of excellence and 5 stars on the Rogers Video web-site.
Allegra, you missed Keith at the threatre?? Didn’t you both bring the never ending ambilical cord with you — his and hers cell phones?? Jenn and I are HOPELESS with meeting places. I always receive the call “Mom where are you!!” Of course, we are both waiting at the agreed upon meeting place EXCEPT she’s in one place and I’m in another.
Alas, as previously reported, Keith lost his cell phone and it can’t be replaced until Paul comes back from his jolly polly holiday. Oh, and this isn’t a great movie, it’s just an entertaining movie. And god knows, these days, that’s enough.
Yes, I do remember you reporting the loss of Keith’s cell phone, but had thought Paul took care of it already. We tried to see The Bourne Ultimatum, then 3:10 to Yuma (which wasn’t on the web-site) both were sold out. So, we settled for dessert and coffee which was good. The only thing that sucked was that I rushed to get ready, skipped the leave-in conditioner, mouse & hair spray — the end result was that my hair resembled that of a scarecrow!