Glen Kenner
Bio
Novelist & short story writer Glen Kenner lives in St Louis, Missouri, with his wife, cats and books. Years spent in sales has made his skin insanely thick and able to withstand all criticism.
Stories (4/0)
Top 3 Things Wrong with the Sisters Brothers (2018)
No movie is perfect. Here are the top 3 things wrong with this one. Number 3 The Sisters Brothers is a darkly comedic western, based on the novel of the same name by Patrick deWitt. It is a morality tale that moves at the pace of life in 1851: pleasantly slow though not necessarily easy, punctuated by unapologetic graphic violence. It feels gritty and hot and uncomfortable despite, and because of, the breathtakingly beautiful scenery of the American west coast from Oregon to San Francisco. It’s against this backdrop of the nature of man and animal that the Sisters brothers Eli (John C Reilly) and Charlie (Joaquin Phoenix) head out on a mission as experienced hired hitman for their boss, the Commodore. They quibble and fight and care for each other as brothers do. And, over the course of this perhaps last adventure, they grow into characters the audience loves despite their acts of cold-blooded murder. Where the writing goes wrong is in not allowing the same visible growth in John Morris (Jake Gyllenhaal). Morris is a detective, known to the Sister brothers, and also working for the Commodore, assigned to find the chemist Hermann Kermit Warm (Riz Ahmed) who is thought to have developed a formula that identifies gold where it lies in a river. After Warm is tracked down and captured by Morris, the chemist reveals that his plan is to use the gold to fund a utopian city in Dallas, Texas, where mankind can strive for higher ideals than what he sees around him in the mid-19th century. It’s this conversation that the screenwriters expect us to believe changes Morris’ mind, along with his reflection on the torture, as described by Warm, that the Sisters brothers will most certainly inflict on the chemist. The screenwriters, Frenchmen Jacques Audiard (who also directed) and Thomas Bidegain, must have thought this was enough of a reason for Morris to risk everything, including his life, to help Warm. But it’s not. Not even close. We’re never even sure if Morris believes in Warm’s vision, though we do know he doesn’t look forward to witnessing torture. But there’s no indication that Morris would be required to witness the torture or that he would have to stick around at all after the brothers show up. And Warm’s no innocent bystander as a detective in the employ of the Commodore. We have every reason to believe that he’s done this before, been paid well, and had no qualms about doing it again and again. So why change his mind now about his loyalty to his boss, the Commodore? We don’t know. The writers had plenty of opportunities to tell us but they missed them all. A few lines in his journal, either spoken by him while writing them or found later by Eli, would have easily given the audience the reason it needs to feel a true sense of loss when Morris succumbs to the effects of his own formula. At any rate, the opportunity is lost and I can’t help but to think that either this scene was cut or simply not taken from the novel that, presumably, gave the reader a reason to care. But we don’t.
By Glen Kenner6 years ago in Geeks
Spoiled Rotten—'Venom' (2018)
TL:WR—Ignore the critics if you’re a superhero movie fan, especially if you follow the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) and/or are a fan of Tom Hardy, and see Venom on the big screen; all others skip this flick for better choices currently playing at a theater near you. 3/5 STARS but a week from now I'll probably wish I gave it less.
By Glen Kenner6 years ago in Geeks
