Given the amount of awkwardly snappy dialogue found in “Baby Driver” (2017), I shall feel no shame in turning this review into a gearhead punfest for a film whose plot stalls out just before the checkered flag. The backstory (good kid collides head-on with bad dude) is finely tuned and the setup (one last job, girlfriend waiting for a fast getaway) is a high-octane classic, but the leaky climax is all over the road, loose in, tight out and full of knocks, pings and run-on. Not even the music, which flows like pure diesel, can jump-start this poor-handling caper flick.
Archives for posts with tag: Jon Hamm
Whenever I’m watching a movie like “Beirut” (2018), where nobody changes clothes for days and the sun is beating down, I’m thinking how bad I’d be smelling and how much I’d want to take a shower. But I also pay attention to the plot, because it’s like a big game of poker where the winner is always the person who doesn’t give a shit the most. If I were Jon Hamm, I’d be pretty happy at my transition away from TV (and far away from “Million Dollar Arm”) to a starring role in a major espionage thriller alongside Rosamund Pike.
If you were a sports agent who invited dozens of media members and baseball scouts to see a couple of unknown Indian kids, you would not wear a Los Angeles Dodgers hat at the tryout. (OK, I got that off my chest.) “Million Dollar Arm” (2014) stars a cliche of a hotshot agent who thinks India might be an untapped source of baseball talent – and baseball marketing dollars. There’s an awkwardly forced love interest subplot, too. Everyone learns a lot about themselves (it’s a Disney film). Just meh. In India, cows may have souls. Unfortunately, “Million Dollar Arm” does not.
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