20th century period pieces ho...
There's a great movie to be made of the CIA fuckery in Latin America, and sometimes, for brief periods American Made looks the part. My thoughts here are gonna sound negative on a movie that I mostly enjoyed, but the missed opportunity here stings. Its breezy, its fun, and its purposely evasive about engaging with its own content. It sidelines its meaty part of history to tell a story about a cocksure Tom Cruise type increasingly compromising himself while growing an unwieldy fortune. All the late 70's/early 80's detail is fun to drink in, and despite every faucet of the film being only surface level deep, its exterior is shiny and appealing. Tom Cruise didn't make his version of Goodfellas or Boogie Nights by a long shot, but at least he tried.
The Thurgood Marshall of the early 1940's gets a hero worship film, and you know what? It works, it works really well. Chadwick Boseman (with charisma out his ears) and Josh Gad (leaning hard into his actual Jewish heritage) play a variation on the mismatched/buddy cop formula on a legal thriller that is itself a variation on the formerly prevalent legal thrillers of the 90's. Its a bit cornpone, but its sincerity, wit, great dialog (or maybe its Boseman's verve and charisma, hard to tell), and technical execution (great framing) make it anything but a boring screed. My theater friggin applauded at the end of this, I suppose that makes it a successful crowd pleaser. I was clapping too I should add.
