Newb co-writer, producer and director Aharon Keshales was close to having a great film, but sadly missed the mark with many rookie filmmaking mistakes. For starters, many scenes were way too long and unnecessary, and the slow pacing made the two-hour runtime feel endless. This film needed at least 20 mins cut out of it to maintain suspense and make it more engaging.
Then, having random events happen that are irrelevant to the main narrative detract from the film's main premise; at around the one hour mark, the story basically hits the reset button and a entirely different narrative begins. It's like the beginning of a different episode and it all happens purely by chance and key conflicts of the first hour are completely inconsequential to what follows. You keep expecting them to intersect, but they never do. There's no motivation or reason behind it, a random event simply happens for no other reason than the writers merely wanted to put Jimmy in another tough spot.
That's the major issue this film had, the disjointed and convoluted events that confuse the narrative, and make you lose interest in the characters and faith in their motivations - like when Jimmy goes from a sweet and doting schlub to a one-shot-killing henchmen destroyer - it gets really implausible in a hurry. To make matters worse, Keshales decides to ruin a happy and satisfying ending with a fade-out and fade-in enigmatic final shot that adds yet another question to the already convoluted mess.
Nevertheless, all casting and performances were excellent, especially Sudeikis and Lilly with their convincing chemistry, and the score and cinematography where spot on. It's too bad the writing couldn't have been tighter and more focused.
