Crime Story

I can't believe what I saw made the final cut-to-market. This film by Adam Lipsius should be a film school example of what NOT to do.

Firstly, this is the perfect example of how a score can make or break a film, and this has to be one of the worst. I'm used to the typical annoyingly loud, overbearing, non-stop and unfitting score in B-grade films, but this was a whole new level of annoying. At the start, I kept yelling at Dreyfuss to "answer the damn door!". But it was the score - a constant knocking sound. Throughout, you'll hear clanging, ringing, banging etc... was there even a composer in this production, or just some random tools in a garage being slammed around?

Then you have Lipsius' incoherent and convoluted story, with dialogue and scenes that will make you shake your head. Why did he shoot the bathroom door where Nan was if he loved and cared about her so much? Don't even get me started on the plot and technical issues, that made what was supposed to be a criminal underworld story, feel inept, unconvincing and boring as it gets. And that's a real shame, when this is supposed to be "based on true events", and you end up scratching your head and yawning by the end.

Next, you have the barely legible muddled dialogue of Dreyfuss, that when combined with his slow and poorly postured demeanor, I thought he was constipated throughout the entire film. Add in Pruitt Taylor Vince's character Tommy, and you have two geriatric actors trying to get through filming. Aside from their snail-paced movements (I'm sure blame falls on Lipsius' failure to direct his cast properly), the entire film's slow pacing, made the normally comfortable 98 min runtime feel endless. Even Mira Sorvino's performance seemed like it was her first ever acting gig (again, due to Lipsius' failure to direct his cast properly).

His (twitchy) camerawork and cinematography were just awful, and this film needed some serious editing. I really can't find anything redeeming about Crime Story. It's a very generous 3/10 from me (much better than the current 0% on Rotten Tomatoes), all going to the Oscar winners out of pity they'll have this mess on their resumes.

For some reason (easy money), many former A list stars now appear in these no budget revenge thriller crap.

Why someone who appeared in classics like Jaws, Schindler's List or Die Hard would ruin their reputation with dreck like this is beyond me. These are seasoned pros. Surely at some point during pre-production they must have realized this would not be another John Wick.

This particular outing has it all. Shaky handheld cam in almost every scene, LSD trip color grading that looks absolutely atrocious. I can get better looking footage with my Canon EOS DSLR. Bad score, bad acting, terrible script....

Just why? There's no way this will turn a profit. Is it a gamble, is it a tax writeoff? I don't get it.

That was 1 hour and 38 minutes I will never get back. Don't waste your movie watching time on this dud. I watched it thinking how bad can it be with Richard Dreyfuss starring in it. But what is this, his name is listed as just one of the cast, way down on the list. I guess I don't blame him for not wanting top credit for this waste of digital bytes saved desperately to this digital movie cloud only to become rain and evaporate.

I read all the horrible reviews - and they were right!

You can have a magnificent portrait of a very messed up family, such as this! But ......

Just goes ta show ya that you can have great actors (they were having off days here) and what could have been a great story - and who knows why everything went topsy tervey - but it most certainly did.

Obviously the music budget was low. It was AWFUL. Hurt my ears it was so very bad. They tried to recover at the end (during the credits), but that piece swung too far in the other direction of what they assaulted our ears with during the movie.

All in all, a most unpleasant experience. And not so bad that it was at all fun. The sin of it is, it had great potential. Oh well.

I would suggest passing it up as have several other reviewers, but you know your gonna wanna watch it because how can it really be THAT bad!!??

Your mistake, not ours. Oh, wait!!! It was! PS - after "sleeping on it", I had to take it down a star. Yep. THAT bad.

I'm no movie writer but this movie makes really no sense. Horribly put together. Halfway through I was like why am I still watching this movie. Waste of time.