29 Palms

`29 Palms' is such a bad movie...no, wait, it's so bad one can't even call it a movie, so, let me start again...'29 Palms' is such a bad abomination , disguised as a movie, that there are no words negative enough to describe it. Let's put it this way, I'm embarrassed to say I even watched it all the way through. It's so bad that my DVD player never worked right again after running it.

While pleased to see Bruce Gillis finally get a film released for all his effort as a filmmaker, this film is a great disappointment. Great cast, weak script and production. The plot is thin, and hard to follow. Keith David and Chris O'donnell deserve better.

the only reason i rented this movie was because of the title. It was interesting to me since i used to live in the city of 29 palms.

This movie felt like it was a quentin tarantino story, with oliver stone style direction. somewhat similar to Stones "U-Turn" just less complicated, and a less talented cast. Instead of Nick Nolte, Sean Penn, Billy Bob Thornton, and Jennifer Lopez. Its Chris O'Donnell, Rachael Leigh Cook, Jeremy Davies, and Michael Rapaport. Still pretty big names, just not good enough.

The direction wasnt horrible, and the editing was actually pretty good. it felt like it was the directors first attempt at this style of film making. the film held my attention all the up till the last five minutes. then i fell asleep. but i got the just of it. i look forward to future films by Leonardo Ricagni.

A corrupt judge (Michael Lerner) is about to rule on an expansion to a neighboring Indian casino. He tells the Chief (Russell Means) that the FBI has put an undercover agent (Jeremy Davies) in his staff. The man witnesses a group of Indians killing his beloved. The Chief hires the Hit-man (Chris O'Donnell) to kill him. They pay the Hit-man with a bag of cash but he's robbed by a casino Security Guard (Jon Polito) who in turn is robbed by the Cop (Michael Rapaport) who then leaves the bag with the Ticket Clerk (Bill Pullman) for 29 Palms. The bag is then mistakenly taken by the guy originally slated to be killed who picks up the Waitress (Rachael Leigh Cook) stranded when her car broke down.

It's interesting to follow the bag at the beginning. It has a silly ridiculousness about it. It stops being interesting after awhile. I wonder if director Leonardo Ricagni is trying to copy the Coen brothers or something like that. It becomes a boring mess. Chris O'Donnell is not nearly scary enough as a hit-man. Rapaport is a good weasel but none of the characters are particularly compelling. The movie wants it so bad but just doesn't have it.

The central plot of this film is promising - an enigmatic drifter finds a bag of money and has the foresight to realize people are after it, so he places several decoy bags out there to confuse everyone while keeping the money for himself.

In the hands of a director with more experience, this might have been a pretty good movie. It's still entertaining but there are moments that make you cringe.

Jeremy Davies (the mumbling astronaut in "Solaris") is the drifter. Chris O'Donnell is the hitman trying to recover his money, which coincidentally, was to be his fee for killing the drifter, who was mistaken for an FBI informant. Now there's a laugh, Jeremy Davies as an FBI agent.

Veteran Coen Brothers bit player, Joe Polito, plays a security guard after the money. Under good direction, he's a pretty decent actor, but here he looks like someone's brother-in-law who stumbled into a movie role.

Not a bad first time effort by the writer and director. They tried a bit too hard to copy other people (the Coen Brothers most notably) by assembling a quirky cast and making a film that combines suspense and humor. You could do worse on a slow weekday night than to rent this one.