Arkansas

That's it. An intelligently written, well directed and well produced, greatly acted and tastefully photographed movie. Stylish and clear headed. Arkansas deserves at least a 7 on IMDB, like a lot of quite slow and clever little gems stuck around the 6. If you love cinema, do not miss this little jewel. Characters are graciously sketched in their lovely, human weirdness. You do not know a lot about them, but you can sense their past in their words, faces and actions. Liam Hemsworth is a little affected in a couple of scenes, but everyone else is credible even when exaggeratedly over the top, like Malkovich. Watch this movie if you want to watch a good, well-narrated and entertaining story. Cinema really needs this kind of productions, even if the ratings tell us that people need less quality.

I did not have high expectations for this and thought it as no more than a 50/50 proposition to even make it through it. But I was pleasantly surprised by how well it held my interest and the casting was well-done, with the exception of Liam Hemsworth, who projected all of the personality of wallpaper, and may as well not be there at all when sharing screen time with the likes of John Malkovich.

The story is rather loose and ramshackle, going back and forth in time. There is definitely a wanna-be Coen Brothers vibe here, but you could do a lot worse for influences. Keep an open mind and your expectations to a minimum and you may just enjoy this one.

Well I'm just surprised by the low rating Arkansas gets. I read a lot of negative reviews, stating Clark Duke wants to be like Quentin Tarantino but failing in doing so. I can't agree with that. Tarantino is Tarantino, he's the master in this genre and almost everybody loves him for that, me first as I'm a big fan of all the movies he directed yet. Clark Duke on the other hand did a pretty good job with Arkansas. For his directing debut I thought it was more than convincing. Sure he must be a big fan of Tarantino, but then again who isn't? But also as an actor he gave a good performance, his character was a delight to watch, and so were the characters of Vince Vaughn and Liam Hemsworth. Each character adds something special to the plot, a story that is well written, a sometimes intriguing story but most of the time a very enjoyable story to watch. So yes I'm very surprised Arkansas doesn't get higher ratings. It's a mystery to me what those one star reviewers are trying to achieve, is that really the worst movie they ever watched? I guess they don't watch much movies then because I've seen thousands worse movies than this one. Anyway, if you really like this genre of movies just give this one a fair chance, I did and was surely not disappointed.

2 small time criminals accidentally get the chance of running a drugs dealing business. Will they succeed in running it successfully or die trying?

I liked this movies' laidback, slowburning feel, but I guess the regular crime fans wont like this movie, because the focus of this movie is first most about the characters instead of cool poses and shootouts, although there are still a few pretty cruel murder scenes to be seen.

Acting is terrific. Even Liam Hemsworth is good and Vince Vaughn plays one of his best serious acting performances ever. Supporting roles are good as well.

Any bad? Not really, but this movie was based upon a novel and the director followed that novel structure with many jumps in time, which dont really work for the movie. The story structure is somewhat disjointed. What works in a book often does not work well in a movie.

Other than that minor criticism, I would recommend this movie to any arthouse movie fan of subtle, slowburning crime dramas. It mesmerized me and I will start paying attention to other works of this great director called Clark Duke.

Pretty good story, love Vince Vaughn and Helmsworth was good too. Good pace and action, worth a watch.