 Mystic River (2003) I find it endlessly infuriating to see a film with such talent onscreen that's so patently lazy behind the camera. Shots seem thrown together with no thought of their content or composition, and scenes slam into each other with no sense of pacing or mood. And though Tim Robbins and Sean Penn give solidly Oscar®-worthy performances, they're just constantly derailed by Eastwood's non-style. Maybe I was weaned on too many crappy "style over substance" films, like, oh, I don't know … Raging Bull, or, hmmmm, Lawrence of Arabia? Jaws? Alien? Okay, granted none of these were really great character studies (even Raging Bull was focused on how pretty the blood was that exploded from DeNiro's eye sockets) … but they were all at least interesting to watch. Mystic River is just dull. And that's unfortunate, because the story and the characters are really interesting. But Eastwood made me not care. He did the same thing with Unforgiven, Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, and Whole Foods, the one time I saw him shopping there. What could have been an entertaining and thought-provoking trip to pick up some meatless chicken became insufferably boring as Clint deliberated his product selections with overly careful yet totally aimless consideration. Perhaps I should put Eastwood up on the shelf with Robert Altman, and just not see anything he makes ever again. Past a certain age, these guys just don't have the impetus to create real drama, instead giving us endless cinematic colonoscopies.
Review by Crimedog |