A Complete Unknown: Not come Oscar time!

A Complete Unknown (2024) • View trailer

Five stars (out of five). Rated R, for profanity

Available via: Movie theaters

By Derrick Bang 

Director James Mangold’s mesmerizing depiction of Bob Dylan’s early years is laden with electrifying moments.

 

Early on, Joan Baez (Monica Barbaro) is the self-assured, veteran stage performer,
and Bob Dylan (Timothée Chalamet) is just a nervous kid ... but that dynamic changes
quickly, and quite dramatically.

The first comes quickly, when a scruffy 19-year-old leaves Minnesota for New York’s Greenwich Village, with little more than a guitar and the clothes he wore, in order to visit Woody Guthrie, with whom he had become obsessed after reading the legendary folk singer’s autobiography.

It’s January 1961: a quietly intimate moment in the hospital room where Guthrie (Scoot McNairy) has long been under care for Huntington’s disease (for which there was no treatment, at the time). His frequent visitor is Pete Seeger (Edward Norton), who has learned how to understand his longtime friend’s mostly unintelligible attempts at speech. Young Dylan (Timothée Chalamet) appears in the doorway; Seeger invites him inside.

 

Guthrie spots the guitar slung against Dylan’s back, and gestures for a song.

 

The young man obliges.

 

Like ... wow.

 

Movie magic at its finest.

 

A similarly powerful scene comes much later; it involves a cigarette passed between two people standing on opposite sides of a chain-link fence: unexpectedly sweet, intimate ... and sad.

 

Mangold and co-scripter Jay Cocks based their film on Elijah Wood’s 2015 non-fiction book, Dylan Goes Electric: Newport, Seeger, Dylan and the Night that Split the Sixties. The result is rigorously authentic to actual events — warts and all — allowing for occasional fabrications for dramatic purposes. The time frame is brief, from early 1961 to the galvanic, game-changing evening of July 25, 1965, during Dylan’s closing set at that year’s Newport Folk Festival.

 

To say that Chalamet fully inhabits this performance is the worst of understatements. It isn’t merely an uncanny replication of Dylan’s look, posture, mannerisms and the cadence of his mumbled, almost whispered speaking voice. Chalamet also sings and performs more than 40 songs during the course of this rhapsodic film, often sounding more like Dylan than the man himself.

 

The dramatic arc here will be familiar to those who’ve followed the careers of artists who burst explosively onto the scene, and then become pigeon-holed. Some are content to stay in such boxes, cheerfully riding the money machine; others — the genuinely talented — chafe at public expectations.

 

The resulting weight can be crippling. What, if anything, does an artist owe his public?

Asteroid City: A heaping helping of peculiar

Asteroid City (2023) • View trailer

Three stars (out of five). Rated PG-13, for suggestive material and fleeting nudity

Available via: Movie theaters

By Derrick Bang • Published in The Davis Enterprise, 7.7.23

Calling filmmaker Wes Anderson “eccentric” is like saying the Pope is slightly Catholic. The word doesn’t begin to convey the vast scope of Anderson’s outré sensibilities.

 

The motel manager (Steve Carell, left) is distracted by another atomic bomb test,
when J.J. Kellogg (Liev Schreiber, right) and his son Clifford (Aristou Meehan) arrive
in Asteroid City.

As one would expect, the results have been mixed. ranging from dazzling hits (The Grand Budapest Hotel, Fantastic Mr. Fox) to, shall we say, lesser efforts (The Darjeeling Limited, The French Dispatch).

But Anderson — a true artiste — remains undaunted, which is just fine; even his bizarre films are interesting … and everything he does is visually fascinating.

 

That’s certainly the case with Asteroid City, which is a dazzling display of architectural whimsy by Anderson, production designer Adam Stockhausen, and the art direction team headed by Stéphane Cressend. I mean, like wow; you’ve never seen so many pastels. They’ve gotta be Oscar-nominated.

 

Whether this colorful setting is supported by an equally compelling story … is another matter. Anderson and co-writer Roman Coppola’s script is, ah, really Out There.

 

The film begins in standard-ratio black and white, as a host (Bryan Cranston) presents the back-story to the newest production by celebrated playwright Conrad Earp (Edward Norton). We subsequently become the “audience,” as a huge cast of actors present the play in three acts (plus an epilogue). These dominant portions of the film are in stylized wide-screen pastels, sumptuously staged by cinematographer Robert D. Yeoman.

 

The actors occasionally break character in between scenes, which adds yet another (often confusing) layer to the story-within-a-story.

 

The year is 1955, the setting Asteroid City, a dot-on-the-map desert community — population 87 — in the American Southwest. The enclave includes a luncheonette, a gas station, a phone booth, an unfinished highway ramp, and a motel comprising a dozen or so cute little bungalows.

 

The city is named for its regional monument: a massive crater created by the grapefruit-size Arid Plains Meteorite, also on display. Small radio telescopes and an observatory can be seen not far away.

 

The occasion is Asteroid Day, a celebration which has gathered five junior scientists and their families; master of ceremonies Gen. Grif Gibson (Jeffrey Wright) acknowledges each teen’s fabulous invention with an award, followed by the presentation of the annual Hickenlooper Scholarship to one of the quintet.

 

Glass Onion: Layers of delight

Glass Onion (2022) • View trailer

Four stars (out of five). Rated PG-13, for strong language, violence, sexual candor and drug content

Available via: Netflix

By Derrick Bang • Published in The Davis Enterprise, 12.30.22

Rian Johnson reminded me how much I miss well-crafted murder mysteries.

 

Consider a few classics: Sleuth, The Last of Sheila, Deathtrap, Gosford Park and The Usual Suspects. Each is a blend of twisty plotting and mildly snarky attitude.

 

Tech billionaire Miles Bron (Edward Norton, center) and several of his guests — from
left, Claire (Kathryn Hahn), Whiskey (Madelyn Cline), Lionel (Leslie Odom Jr.) and
Birdie (Kate Hudson) — are quite surprised by the identity of their gathering's
newest arrival.

The writer/director garnered well-deserved admiration for 2019’s Knives Out, which — among its many other delights — gave star Daniel Craig an opportunity to craft a memorable character far removed from a certain shaken-not-stirred secret agent.

We all wondered, when Craig’s second outing as sharp-eyed sleuth Benoit Blanc neared arrival, if Johnson could pull it off a second time. So many filmmakers have run afoul of the sophomore curse.

 

Well, not this one.

 

Glass Onion is just as clever — and engaging — as its predecessor. Although driven by a tantalizing whodunit and whydunit, those features almost take second place to the fact that this film is pure fun. At a time when numerous recent releases have run far too long in the hands of self-indulgent directors, this one earns its 139 minutes. Goodness, I wanted it to keep going.

 

Johnson’s fondness for the genre is obvious, and his new film is a loving — and cheekily updated — riff on Agatha Christie’s And Then There Were None.

 

The story begins as identical, elaborately carved wooden boxes are delivered to scientist Lionel Toussaint (Leslie Odom Jr.), Connecticut Gov. Claire Debella (Kathryn Hahn), fashion designer Birdie Jay (Kate Hudson) and macho streaming celebrity Duke Cody (Dave Bautista). Editor Bob Ducsay’s sleek split-screen montage reflects the fact that these are (of course!) large puzzle boxes, which the quartet ultimately solves via phone collaboration.

 

Inside: an invitation to a murder mystery weekend hosted by longtime friend and tech billionaire Miles Bron (Edward Norton), at his private island in Greece. His estate’s stand-out feature: a massive, glass-enclosed conservatory shaped like an onion.

 

Elsewhere, the recipient of a fifth box extracts her invitation via hilarious old-school methodology. (Whatever works, right?) She turns out to be Cassandra “Andi” Brand (Janelle Monáe), co-founder and former CEO of Bron’s tech company Alpha, unfairly ousted — not long ago — via some acrimonious legal maneuvering.

 

Everybody — most particularly Bron — is astonished when Blanc turns up, identical invitation in hand. The detective, unswervingly polite to the core, is embarrassed by having unwittingly crashed the party; Bron sets him at ease. After all, the cunningly conceived weekend will be far more successful if he’s able to outfox the world-famous Benoit Blanc.

Motherless Brooklyn: The Big Apple's rotten core

Motherless Brooklyn (2019) • View trailer 
4.5 stars. Rated R, for violence, profanity and drug use
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 11.1.19

Fans of Jonathan Lethem’s award-winning 1999 crime fiction novel will be quite surprised by what director/scripter Edward Norton has done with it.

The spider and the fly: Thoroughly irritated by the persistent investigation mounted by
private detective Lionel Essrog (Edward Norton, right), rapacious New York City developer
Moses Randolph (Alec Baldwin) demands a face-to-face, hoping to make an offer his
pipsqueak tormentor dare not refuse.

Lethem’s Motherless Brooklyn, although contemporary to its late 20th century arrival, has the attitude, atmosphere and plot stylings of 1940s and ’50s pulp detective thrillers. Revering that style as a jumping-off point, Norton has retained the primary character — and very little else — while bouncing him back to 1957, and dropping him into an entirely new story that blends fact, fiction and noir sensibilities in a manner we’ve not seen since 1974’s Chinatown.

In a word, the result is mesmerizing.

Chinatown scripter Robert Towne ingeniously employed a “simple” gumshoe case to illuminate the real-world corruption and power-mongering behind Los Angeles’ bureaucratic theft of Owens River water, as ruthlessly orchestrated by civil engineer William Mulholland (fictionalized by John Huston’s Noah Cross). 

Norton, in turn, dumps Lethem’s intriguing protagonist into the clandestine, Tammany Hall-style empire ruled by the even more powerful Robert Moses, the mid-20th century developer/builder who — by manipulating politicians behind the scenes — ruthlessly transformed New York City into his vision of a metropolis. It’s a fascinating slice of history, which Norton cleverly blends with the character that he also plays in this thoroughly absorbing drama … but it has absolutely nothing to do with Lethem’s novel.

The film opens at a sprint: Lionel Essrog (Norton) and colleague Gilbert Coney (Ethan Suplee), both operatives of a small-time detective agency run by Frank Minna (Bruce Willis), accompany their boss when he arranges a meeting with shadowy figures left unspecified. The acutely perceptive Lionel knows that Frank is up to something, and likely something dangerous; this hunch proves accurate in the worst possible way, when Minna winds up dead.

Frank was more than merely a boss to Lionel; he also was mentor, friend and protector. Indeed, all four agency operatives — including Tony (Bobby Cannavale) and Danny (Dallas Roberts) — emerged from the same Catholic orphanage, back in the day, where Minna became their father-figure. 

His murder therefore hits Lionel quite hard, particularly since he is far from “normal.” Lionel is obsessive/compulsive and also suffers from an uncontrollable tendency to erupt in nonsense speech: often punning, rhyming and “clanging” against what somebody else has just said. He’s constantly forced to apologize for the “glass in the brain” that prompts such spontaneous outbursts; we recognize this as Tourette Syndrome, a designation not at all familiar to the characters in this re-imagined 1950s version of Lethem’s novel.

Isle of Dogs: A tail-wagging triumph

Isle of Dogs (2018) • View trailer 
Five stars. Rated PG-13, for dramatic intensity and some violent images
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 3.23.18

This one is a treasure.

Wes Anderson’s films are eccentric — to say the least — but, over time, his unique brand of quirk has become ever more beguiling. Recall that 2014’s The Grand Budapest Hotel won four of its nine Academy Award nominations, and that Anderson has earned six nominations himself, dating back to a scripting nod for 2002’s The Royal Tennenbaums.

Twelve-year-old Atari, in an act of defiance against his guardian, the mayor of Megasaki
City, isn't about to let his beloved pet remain quarantined with all the other dogs on an
outlying "trash island."

One of the other six was earned when he helmed 2010’s Fantastic Mr. Fox, an engagingly warped adaptation of Roald Dahl’s droll little tale, presented via an insane amount of painstakingly detailed stop-motion puppet animation.

Anderson has returned to that form with Isle of Dogs, and it’s a work of even more incandescent brilliance: a thoroughly enchanting underdog fable for our time, and a similarly stunning achievement in puppet animation, and the jaw-droppingly detailed micro-sets they inhabit.

The only applicable descriptor — a term not to be used lightly — is awesome.

But the film isn’t merely fun to watch; it’s also powered by a genius storyline co-written by Anderson, Roman Coppola, Jason Schwartzman and Kunichi Nomura (the latter a Japanese writer, DJ, radio personality and occasional actor who made brief appearances in Lost in Translation and, yes, The Grand Budapest Hotel).

As often is the case with animated films, it’s difficult to praise the “acting” per se, since the characters aren’t flesh and blood. And yet there’s no doubt that Anderson — alongside animation director Mark Waring, and puppet master Andy Gent — has coaxed impressively sensitive performances from his many stars. Line readings perfectly match facial expressions and body language; double-takes and comic timing are delivered with the impeccable mastery of a stand-up veteran.

In short, we couldn’t be more engaged if these were “real” performers ... which would be impossible, of course, since dogs don’t talk.

But you may come away from this film thinking they do.

Collateral Beauty: Only mildly appealing

Collateral Beauty (2016) • View trailer 
Three stars. Rated PG-13, for thematic elements and fleeting profanity
By Derrick Bang

Overt sentimentality is a tough sell in this cynical era, so director David Frankel is to be congratulated: For the most part, his film manages to be sincerely poignant, without sliding too much into eye-rolling schmaltz.

While trying to finish a quiet, isolated dinner, Howard (Will Smith) is surprised — and
quickly annoyed — to be confronted by the personification of Love (Keira Knightley),
unaware that she's actually an actress hired to deceive him.

Allan Loeb’s original script is an audacious blend of It’s a Wonderful Life and Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol, reconfigured for modern times. That’s risky for all sorts of reasons, most notably because “borrowing” from such beloved classics invites comparisons that make most such endeavors fall short. Whether this update succeeds will be up to each viewer’s tolerance for Frank Capra-style melodrama (known as “Capra-corn,” back in the day).

This also is an unusual effort from a writer best known for slapstick moron comedies such as The Switch, The Dilemma and (God help us) Here Comes the Boom. But Loeb apparently has a more serious side, and he wrestles with some fairly weighty concepts here. It’s easy to see why the result piqued the interest of star Will Smith, who has demonstrated a fondness for holiday-timed melodramas such as The Pursuit of Happyness and Seven Pounds.

Smith is very good at morose angst; he suffers persuasively, radiating anguish with an intensity that can be painful to watch. We definitely feel for the guy, in such storylines, and — as a given narrative progresses — we become invested in his search for salvation, closure, relief or whatever else seems just beyond his reach.

He stars here as Howard, a charismatic New York advertising executive with a flair for inspiring both clients and staff. We meet him giving a warm pep talk to the employees of his successful firm: a moment enjoyed equally by his longtime business partners — and friends — Whit (Edward Norton), Claire (Kate Winslet) and Simon (Michael Peña).

But that was then. Flash-forward a few years later, as the story actually begins, and personal tragedy — the death of his young daughter — has reduced Howard to a disheveled, morose and perpetually silent shadow of his former self. He shows up to work each day solely to build elaborate domino mazes, ultimately knocking down each creation, then starting another. The business, left without its captain, has been sliding into oblivion.

Whit, Claire and Simon don’t know what to do. Every means of engaging Howard has been ignored or rebuffed, and — because he owns controlling shares of their company — they can’t even act on a friendly takeover offer. (We assume it’s friendly. Loeb’s script is a bit sketchy on certain important details: a failing that becomes more noticeable as the story proceeds.)

Birdman: A dark comedy that soars

Birdman (2014) • View trailer 
4.5 stars. Rated R, for relentless profanity, sexual candor and brief violence
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 10.31.14

This isn’t merely a movie; it’s a bravura display of cinematic pizzazz as mesmerizing as its three starring performances.

This one demands repeat viewing. First time out, you’ll be overwhelmed by the stylistic approach — dazzlingly so, to the point of wanting to applaud — and then you’ll need a second round to better appreciate everything else going on.

When Riggan Thomson (Michael Keaton, left) learns that co-star Mike Shiner (Edward
Norton) has hijacked some of his best personal material for a lavish newspaper interview,
raw fury propels the two men into the sort of laughably flimsy fist-fight that one would
expect from two guys who haven't the faintest idea how to throw a punch.

We’ve never seen anything quite like this.

Granted, director/co-scripter Alejandro González Iñárritu borrows respectfully from predecessors going all the way back to Robert Wiene (1920’s silent The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari), with strong nods toward Alfred Hitchcock (1948’s Rope), Roman Polanski (1965’s Repulsion) and Paddy Chayefsky (1976’s Network).

Much more recently, Joe Wright attempted similar cinematographic trickery with 2012’s Anna Karenina, but with far less success; the stage-bound stylization called too much attention to itself, at the expense of the story.

But that, too, is the genius of Iñárritu’s Birdman: The audacious approach is part of the story, indeed the throbbing heartbeat of an exhilarating descent into artistic madness, whose pulse is amplified by a score devoted solely to Grammy Award-winner Antonio Sanchez’s percussive drumming.

That latter affectation is jarring at first, particularly as Sanchez’s efforts become pervasive, his shifting tempos altering the story’s rhythm and pace in a manner normally handled by cutting wizardry. But editors Douglas Crise and Stephen Mirrione seemingly have very little to do in this film, because cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki’s brilliantly composed scenes are — like our central character’s relentless fever dream — one long tracking shot.

Yep. For 119 minutes. Over the course of this narrative’s roughly three days and nights.

Not entirely true, of course, which is why that word — seemingly — is so crucial. Despite having the appearance of a single extended take, Iñárritu, Lubezki, Crise and Mirrione collaborate quite cleverly to convey this illusion ... just as everything that happens on a Broadway stage is pure artifice.

Except when it isn’t, which is the whole point here. Even before we dive into his rapidly unraveling psyche, Riggan Thomson (Michael Keaton) has lost the ability to separate his actual life from what takes place on stage; his performer’s artifice may be the only thing helping him cling to whatever remains of his sanity. Indeed, how many actors, stretching back centuries, have insisted that they only come alive each night, when they hit their marks ... their vivid, full-color nighttime dreams far more real to them than the washed-out black-and-white of their actual lives?

The Grand Budapest Hotel: Grandly chaotic

The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014) • View trailer 
Four stars. Rating: Rated R, for profanity, sexual candor and brief violence
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 3.21.14

This one’s hard to categorize.

On the one hand, and perhaps most visibly, Wes Anderson’s newest opus is a madcap farce populated by eccentric and oddly polite characters who hearken back to those found within West London’s famed Ealing Studios comedies, during the late 1940s and early ’50s.

With the police hot on their heels, M. Gustave (Ralph Fiennes, left) and his faithful
junior lobby boy, Zero (Tony Revolori), frantically try to figure out where to hide a
priceless Renaissance painting that they have, ah, liberated.

On the other hand, it’s a droll send-up of Agatha Christie mysteries, with suspicious butlers, nosy maids and assorted other shady and avaricious characters, all of them anxious about the contents of a will that keeps throwing up codicils, riders, supplements, postscripts and assorted other appendices, possibly even superseded by the second copy of a second will.

On the third hand, it’s an affectionate ode to an era of more civilized behavior, when traveling strangers regaled each other with fascinating tall tales while enjoying a sumptuous meal; and when courting lovers exchanged passionate letters.

Then, too, there’s an affectionate nod to Inception, with its nested narratives.

And, last but certainly not least, however we choose to define this unapologetically zany melodrama, it most certainly could have come only from the eccentric imagination of director Wes Anderson ... and perhaps that’s the only explanation that matters.

Anderson’s films take place within a fanciful universe of his creation: one slightly off-center from our own, with occasionally familiar cultural landmarks that merely add to the gently bizarre atmosphere, laced with characters who deliver crucial soliloquies and peculiar non-sequitors with equal aplomb, and always with resolutely straight faces.

No character ever laughs at something said by another; at best, the speaker might get a raised eyebrow that Signifies A Great Deal.

In short, Anderson’s films are strange. Very strange, and definitely an acquired taste. I generally swing toward admiration, but not always; his previous outing, Moonrise Kingdom, is a thorough delight ... but I almost couldn’t make it through The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou.

This one falls somewhere in between, leaning more heavily toward the wacky delights of Moonrise Kingdom. Anderson has concocted the script with co-conspirator Hugo Guinness, claiming inspiration from pre-code 1930s Hollywood comedies and the stories and memoirs of Viennese author Stefan Zweig (!).

Avid film fans with a fondness for old-style filmmaking technique likely will have a ball. Mainstream viewers who casually wander into the theater will be convinced, after only 15 minutes, that the lunatics have taken over the asylum.

And, to be fair, they won’t be wrong.

The Bourne Legacy: In good hands

The Bourne Legacy (2012) • View trailer
Four stars. Rating: PG-13, for considerable violence and grim action
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 8.10.12

Any doubts about the Bourne film series surviving Matt Damon’s departure can be laid to rest; replacement star Jeremy Renner capably opens a new chapter in Robert Ludlum’s popular franchise.

Pursued by both police and an anonymous, shadowy adversary,
Aaron Cross (Jeremy Renner) and Marta Shearing (Rachel Weisz)
hijack a motorcycle and attempt to escape in the confusion of
Manila's insanely crowded streets and alleyways.

Although it’s perhaps not the chapter fans were expecting.

Ludlum, who died in 2001, wrote the three books made into the film trilogy that featured Damon between ’02 and ’07. Ludlum’s estate sanctioned Jason Bourne’s literary revival in an ongoing series of sequels by the prolific Eric Van Lustbader, who thus far has written seven more, starting with 2004’s The Bourne Legacy.

But although this new film shares the same title, that’s all it shares. Like most latter-day James Bond films, which also borrowed Ian Fleming’s book and short story titles — and nothing else — director/co-scripter Tony Gilroy concocted an entirely new narrative suggested by Ludlum’s conspiracy-laden premise.

And rather than tagging a new actor to play Jason Bourne — thus cleverly leaving the door open for Damon’s return, at some future point — Renner is introduced as Aaron Cross, one of several “sidebar assets” in the U.S. black ops agency’s clandestine Treadstone project.

Gilroy scripted all three of Damon’s Bourne films; he also wrote and directed the sleekly sinister George Clooney vehicle, Michael Clayton, and had fun riffing on industrial espionage with Julia Roberts and Clive Owen, in 2009’s Duplicity. So it’s safe to say that Gilroy knows the territory.

Gilroy wisely takes his time with the first act of this new film, introducing Cross during an extreme survival training session in the Alaskan wilderness. Details are sketchy, aside from the same heightened senses and reflexes that characterized Bourne; Cross also carefully maintains a daily regimen of pills — one blue, one green — that are safeguarded in a container worn around his neck.

Back in D.C., high-level spook Eric Byer (Edward Norton) frets over the public appearance of Dr. Albert Hirsch (Albert Finney), recognized from the previous film in this series. Similarly, Pam Landy (Joan Allen), Jason Bourne’s former handler, has threatened to go public with Treadstone’s seamier details.

Feeling that they have no choice, Byer and fellow conspirator Mark Turso (Stacy Keach) decide to shut down Treadstone and its half-dozen human assets, despite their highly effective work in various world hot spots. And in this realm of unsupervised behavior, “shutting down” has lethal ramifications for said assets.

Pride and Glory: None of either

Pride and Glory (2008) • View trailer for Pride and Glory
One star (out of five). Rating: R, for violence, drug use, torture, nudity and relentless profanity
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 10.30.08
Buy DVD: Pride and Glory • Buy Blu-Ray: Pride and Glory [Blu-ray]

Given the degree to which he micro-manages the films with which he's involved — going so far as to supply an uncredited script that helped shape this summer's The Incredible Hulk — I'm amazed that Edward Norton would have had anything to do with a flick as offensively tawdry as Pride and Glory.

Having just learned that three of his cop associates have been slaughtered, and
that a fourth lies near death in the hospital, Jimmy Egan (Colin Farrell, left)
broods while brother-in-law Ray (Edward Norton) offers comfort. Alas, we
quickly realize that Jimmy knows more than he's telling about the catastrophe,
as Ray — a seasoned detective — will discover on his own.

This laughably grotesque cop thriller would be more at home as a late-night original on Cinemax, where viewers expect little beyond mindless carnage.

I wasn't surprised to discover that this film had been sitting on a studio shelf for a few years. It should have stayed there.

Director Gavin O'Connor showed genuine potential with 2004's Miracle, which offered both a great story and a memorable performance from star Kurt Russell; it remains one of the best of this decade's many inspirational sports sagas. And while I can't fault a director who wants to stretch his wings, O'Connor obviously should have tried some other genre, because he's impressively unsuited for urban thrillers.

Norton can be an excellent actor; he absolutely isn't here. Either he gave up and phoned in his performance, or O'Connor lacked the ability to coax a better job out of his star ... or both.

Either way, the result is embarrassing.

The same is true of Colin Farrell, also capable of much better work, but here reduced to a stereotype so shopworn that it should have been retired 40 years ago: the opportunistic Irish cop gone bad, whose increasingly vile behavior threatens everything he holds dear, etc., etc.

I once thought Farrell had the makings of a promising career. After high-profile rubbish such as Alexander, Ask the Dust, Miami Vice and now this, I'm no longer certain.

Because, let's face it, at no time could this misbegotten script — credited to Gavin O'Connor, Gregory O'Connor and Robert Hopes, from a screenplay by Gavin O'Connor and Sacramento's own Joe Carnahan — have been anything but an artistic fiasco for any actor foolish enough to embrace it.

The broad strokes probably came from Carnahan; Pride and Glory bears the blend of violence and corruption that we'd expect from the guy who brought us Narc, Smokin' Aces and Blood, Guts, Bullets and Octane.

Somewhere along the way, though, too many additional hands got involved; the result is a laughably ridiculous picture that's too stupid to be taken seriously, but not stylized enough to be passed off (or enjoyed) as high camp.

What Pride and Glory is, mostly, is a waste of time ... and, clocking in at slightly more than two hours, that's a lot of wasted time.