Mojave

In no way is this a great movie, but it kept me engaged to the end. Would I watch it again? Absolutely not, but it did have a few redeeming qualities. Specifically: 1) First and foremost, I thought Oscar Isaac was excellent in it. He is clearly the star of the movie and had all of the best lines (Not that there were many of them). 2) There was a bit of suspense in the cat and mouse game between Hedlund and Isaac. 3) I wanted to know how it would turn out and the ending was slightly different than what I expected.

The cons: 1) Hedlund's character is a real jerk and you can't stand him. Almost made me root for Isaac's character. 2) You never really understand why Hedlund's character is so unhappy and such a jerk. 3) The pace moves very slowly at times. 4) Nothing particularly innovative or creative about the script.

This neo-noir should have been better. It could easily have culled an 8 from me. But the writing did not deliver. It's almost as if the writer-director lost a bet, and had to pull out the plot points that meant the difference between this being a good film people would talk about, vs something no one's heard of. Which is a shame, because the writer-director is one of hollywood's most lauded writers going.

I'm soft for desert movies. This one starts out well. Then it moved to L.A. and fast lost its momentum, its pacing, and sill in plotting. And Mark Wahlberg's part? Just filler. Same with Goggins. Literally nothing more than someone for the protagonist to speak to so we don't have to use thought bubbles. In fact, most of the other actors that have talking don't need them, because they don't go anywhere in the story.

If you're watching this in hopes of a twist, then don't bother. There is none.

Otherwise, there's oddly inserted literary references that would only come from a director who was also a writer. Shakespeare, Melville, don't add to the story. They barely even fulfill the purpose of making this story feel more philosophical.

A screenwriter who submitted this script would have been rejected if he was new. Something this flawed could only get greenlit if the writer was already A-list, as this writer was. It violates one of the so called "rules" of scriptwriting -- that every scene, every act, every word, has some role in moving the story forward. This one had too many that didn't.

It's an ages-old conceit that experienced hollywood filmmakers like to make films about hollywood that reveal its meaninglessness, its shallowness, its callous narcissism. This one does all that. Complete with asskissing personal assistants or bedraggled personal assistants. PAs are the lifeblood of the industry, but are rarely depicted in compelling ways. This film is no exception. But not in an instructive nor satisfying way.

Films are too expensive to make merely to make a statement that the film biz doesn't matter. But this one sure works hard at it.

Let's take two emotionally unstable alpha males (one of them a psychopath), and have them cross paths leading to a confrontation and tragedy in the desert - and you have quite an intriguing yarn. My main criticism would be that the protagonist was not that likable a character. He was dissatisfied with his glamorous life and rather unkind to most of the people he encountered in the film. I get that there were issues with his wife and child, however, this gets only a brief mention in the movie. Perhaps it should be have been built upon more to make him a more sympathetic character. Yes, rich people have problems, too - we just weren't entirely sure what his were. BUT - he played his role very well and I did enjoy the movie. Kudos to both actors for their performances. It was suspenseful and fairly quick-paced.

Something that looks like a 'film', specifically this term and the aesthetic to which it implies, I feel has come to be expected of contemporary dramas/character studies. Mojave knows it. It looks to tick a lot of these archetypal boxes: jaded, frustrated characters, blatant motifs (the temptation of Christ?), a redemptive narrative, an undertone of despair that never loosens up until the end of the last arc. Yes with all these elements motivating it's narrative, the movie never achieves a sense of coherency; it's Hitchcockian one moment with it's intermittent key score, and then Fincher-esque the next with it's sweeping pans and use of negative space in shots. It's an actor's playground that, as charming and talented as all the individuals are, doesn't leave a lot for the audience to soak in, unless you really, really like angry, shout-y Mark Wahlberg, who is playing quite possibly the closest characterisation to his real life personality in this role. I never fully understood the goal of the protagonist... I guess it had something to do with doing the right thing and his daughter? Too much Tyler Durton syndrome in concepts like these I feel.

Poor thriller reuniting Garrett Hedlund and Oscar Isaac a few years after they drove to Chicago together with John Goodman in Inside Llewyn Davis. Both are more or less on equal footing here, though. Hedlund plays a screenwriter who goes out to the Mojave to commit suicide. Instead, he meets up with dangerous drifter Isaac who pops into camp obviously just to kill him. Instinctively he resists death, but in the process angers the drifter. When Hedlund returns to civilization, Isaac follows him, hoping to continue their game of death. Not much about this works. Hedlund is a boring actor, and Isaac gives his worst performance ever, at least since he's been a star. You'd think the script must have looked great on paper, but the dialogue comes off as silly and desperately trying to be cool. Walton Goggins and Mark Wahlberg also waste their time in this. It does look good, and it has a few good moments, but, in general, it's just bad.