Life of Crime

"We need to find a way o put him against the wall." Frank Dawson (Robbins) is a businessman with many enemies. When a group of men are looking for revenge on him they decide to take what is most important to him, his wife Mickey (Aniston). They kidnap her and demand a ransom from him. The only downside is that he was going to divorce her and is with his mistress when they call so he's not all that concerned. This puts strain on the kidnappers when plans have to change. This is another movie based off an Elmore Leonard book. If you have seen the other movies from his books (Jackie Brown, 3:10 To Yuma, Get Shorty and most recently Justified) you will know what to expect. The feel of all of them are pretty much alike. This one does have more of a Get Shorty feel to it in the way that it is a very dark comedy and you aren't sure who to root for. The acting is very good and the movie keeps you interested and entertained but I never really got all that into it. I did like all the twists and the events of this but there was just something missing to make me really like it. I also wasn't a big fan of Get Shorty so if you liked that movie you will probably enjoy this much more then I did. Overall, a movie that I thought was OK and worth watching but nothing that really made me think wow, this is good. I give it a B-.

People should really stop claiming this movie is funny, and the trailer should be pulled for false advertising. There's, like, maybe 4-5 jokes in the whole film. I'm not saying 4-5 are funny, I'm saying there are only 4-5 times where the film briefly even tries to be funny.

This is a drama, but a drama written and directed as lightly and carelessly as a comedy. So we don't care about the characters and we don't care about the stakes. But it's not funny either and the romance is just going through the motions - there's no meetcute, there's no "will they, won't they" it's just "boy meets girl, boy spends time with girl, boy and girl are a thing now". The whole film is mostly filler.

It's strange because the casting, the 70's period stuff and the production values are quite good, and the plot makes sense (there are a handful of moments where characters do inexplicable/stupid things but it isn't clear if it's meant to be funny or the scriptwriter is just that dumb) it's just not clear why you would care to watch it. Most of what you end up watching is a couple of mediocre crooks try to figure out how to make a kidnapping work and struggle. If you want to spend 90+ minutes filling in the time wondering about how you might plan a better kidnapping, by all means watch this movie. If you want to be entertained, dramatically, romantically or comedically, please, watch anything else.

I enjoyed this film a lot. It's not ground breaking or stylish or full of violence. It's nice and easy with funny characters and some laugh out loud moments. A we'll put together, charming film.

It's an interesting film that's trying to be a dark comedy but it's not as dark as I would have expected, which made the laughs long in-between.

I've seen this type of comedy in which the victim befriends the captives because their life was not as put together as hoped. This one takes a slower dramatic pace.

Their were some pretty top notch actors in the film like Tim Robbins, John Hawkes and even Mos Def. It's interesting that Jennifer Aniston took on such a small picture, but maybe they thought her appearance would put people in seats(which I guess is true).

Thought the story was good but the pace of the movie just puts me to sleep (Maybe I actually missed the really fun parts while snoring). Don't kill your time with this one.

The summary of this described it as a comedy. I didn't find it funny.

"Life of Crime" from 2013 is based on an Elmore Leonard story, "The Switch," which has some of the same characters as "Jackie Brown." Sadly this is not in Jackie Brown's league. I'll give it this - it has a great soundtrack.

Jennifer Aniston stars as Mickey, married to a prize jerk, Frank (Tim Robbins), who is involved in shady real estate deals and tax evasion. Unbeknownst to her, he's channeling money to a secret bank account, and his trips include meeting up with a young girlfriend Melanie (Isla Fisher). He also plans on divorcing Mickey and marrying Melanie.

Louis (John Hawkes) and Ordell (Mos Def) have the idea of kidnapping Mickey and holding her for a million dollars ransom. They figure they know too much about his illegal activities for him to refuse.

It turns out that the only one with any brains is Melanie. When Frank gets the phone call about Mickey, Melanie takes over. She starts taking the phone calls, claiming Frank isn't around. It finally occurs to the kidnappers that Frank doesn't really want Mickey back.

There are two other men in the plot who are potentially trouble, but in different ways. There is the neo-Nazi racist with more guns than the Army (Mark Boone Junior) and a guy (Will Forte) who bonds with Mickey.

This just didn't hang together for me. It certainly isn't up to the standard of Elmore Leonard as filmed by Tarantino. I think the filmmakers were going for a Tarantino/Cohen Brothers type of movie, but they didn't pull it off.

"Life of Crime" has good ensemble acting and some funny dialogue, but its pace is off, and it has a low-budget feel to it. It also lacks the layers of films like "Fargo" or "Jackie Brown."

I've never been a fan of Jennifer Aniston's, and this didn't move her up on my list. I consider her just okay. When I think of female stars who can carry a film, she isn't one.