Filmmaker Andrew Dominik is somewhat of a hero in these parts for bringing Brad Pitt to Alberta in his 2007 flick The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford . At the risk of being kicked out of the province I’m going to go ahead and say that I found that movie boring. It was a joyous masterpiece however compared to his latest work Killing Them Softly .
Imagine the entire Netflix thriller section forcefully crammed into one movie. That’d be a whole hell of a lot better than Softly which is far too unaffecting to be called a “thriller.”
Brad Pitt plays Jackie a hired gun called in when three buffoons rob an underground gambling ring in New Orleans. There are elements of the story that almost make it interesting for a second but those are bogged down by meandering dialogue and pointless camera trickery.
As Jackie moves through the suspects there are essentially no obstacles in his way. He plans to kill one of the robbers then he goes and finds them then he kills them. Aside from some half-assed “arty” shots it’s almost workmanlike in its display of violence. But that’s probably some sort of all-caps METAPHOR for America.
After all the useless killing story is just a goofy backdrop for the film’s thinly veiled immensely irritating political slant. Throughout the whole movie the characters are all listening to talk radio or watching the news on TV. Did I mention it’s set in 2008 during the stock market crash? Yeah carefully chosen speech excerpts from Bush and Obama are shoehorned into every available space. It makes Sorkin look subtle.
The whole thing boils down to an eye-rollingly dull statement about capitalism and greed. And since it’s all about the money I’d recommend you save some and avoid this waste of screen time at all costs.
Killing Them Softly opens today (Friday November 30)