Benaroya Pictures, Lee Daniels Entertainment, Millennium Films,
Matthew McConaughey, Zac Efron, David Oyelowo, Macy Gray, John Cusack, Nicole Kidman
Jack Jansen (Zac Efron) helps his brother Ward (Matthew McConaughey) who is a reported investigating a convict, Hillary Van Wetter (John Cusack) on death row in rural Florida. Hillary’s confident, Charlotte Bless (Nicole Kidman) convinces Jack that Hillary is innocent, and he tries to convince his brother of that as well. Meanwhile, Jack is really attracted to Charlotte who either likes him, or is just playing him to free her boyfriend Hillary.
This is a dark film, and one that tries to develop their characters really well. Macy Gray has a part here that is one of the better things in the film as a maid who is watching over the boys. She’s sort of a narrator to the film. But there isn’t much going on here. The rural south setting is nicely done, and it does have a creepy swamp type of feel, but the story was really strange to me. I didn’t really care about any of this, and I didn’t care whether Hillary was guilty or not. Nicole Kidman’s character is really strange, and I never did figure out what she was going for. John Cusack is usually pretty decent, but he was sorely miscast in this film, as he had no clue how to play the menacing killer he was supposed to be. All in all, the movie just left me flat.
I really just wanted this to end. Most of the time it was really boring, but then ever so on it would make you so angry at the characters that you really hate them. I didn’t enjoy it very much, and I can see why it was mostly overlooked. I can’t recommend this mess. I didn’t really enjoy it at all.
EdG – EdsReview Dot Com – A Movie Review Blog
