Savages (2012)

[Impact]

Review, Discuss and Have Fun!

[cheesypoofs]

I guess it was alright. I was kinda disappointed though.

[Vanilla]

I thought it was pretty good. Also Del Toro and Hayek work both great and looked to have a lot of fun with their roles. Thats not to say that everyone else was not good. Most did a good job.

8/10

[Webslinger]

Well, that was interesting. I wouldn't quite call Savages a return to form for Oliver Stone, but it is at least a grittier, edgier film than he anything he has made in well over a decade, more in tune with Natural Born Killers than the likes of W. or Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps. While not without its flaws, this film is an entertaining ride that maintains its excitement and intrigue through most of its long running time. It sometimes feels like two different movies given how different the segments with our heroes are from the ones with the villains (controlled and serious vs. frenetic and sometimes so over-the-top they're funny), but it works given that the movie is about the violent collision of these two very different worlds. It's also equally refreshing and disturbing to see Stone resist pulling punches as far as the edgier content in the film is concerned - this is just about as hard an R as they come, due mostly to violence gruesome enough to make even stalwart viewers squirm a little bit. (In particular, I think Stone strikes a perfect note of eeriness in the scene with Del Toro and the lawyer during the first act.) The performances fall into two categories: the straight and the over-the-top. Taylor Kitsch, Aaron Johnson, and Blake Lively occupy the former, while Benicio Del Toro, Salma Hayek, and John Travolta occupy the latter. Kitsch is serviceable (though between his non-demanding performance here and his work in his other 2012 films, I have to assume that he must show significantly stronger chops on Friday Night Lights), Johnson is effective as an innocent guy forced to get his hands dirty, and Lively is up to the task of getting the audience to care about a shallow character. But it's the other actors who get to have the fun and leave the strong impressions: Del Toro is on fire as a thoroughly detestable villain, Hayek seems to be having a ball playing an unlikely cartel leader, and Travolta is as amusingly broad as ever chewing on scenery. The film takes chances by splicing together such radically different threads, but is mostly successful in this aim. One place where it is not particularly effective, however, is the ending, which feels like a cheat and tears down a different possibility that I think would have fit the tone of the film better. It's enough of an apparently deliberate mess that it's probably bound to divide viewers, but if nothing else, Savages is a wacko experience unlike anything else available this summer.

B

[mattmav45]

Yeah, it has its share of problems, but it's still an entertaining ride, and kind of feels like snorting a couple lines of cocaine amidst the boring summer schedule.

There were some surprisingly appealing characters along with some solid performances (Lively and Travolta were the weak links for me). The action isn't spectacular, but it's edgy and gritty enough to do the job. The kidnapping angle didn't do much for me, but thankfully Chon and Ben's interactions and chemistry are just enough to keep the film moving forward. And goddamn, Del Toro was the clear badass in this film, pretty much all of my favorite moments in the film were focused around his character.

As Webslinger said, it's not a real return to form for Stone, but it'll do for the time being.....especially in the middle of summer.

B/B-

Edited July 9, 2012 by mattmav45

[Vanilla]

And goddamn, Del Toro was the clear badass in this film, pretty much all of my favorite moments in the film were focused around his character.

Yea, he was awesome.

[rockNrollaDIM]

"There's something wrong with your love story, baby..."

I enjoyed this immensely. In fact, I thought it was fucking awesome and it is probably my favorite film of 2012. Oliver Stone is back on point with this, and the cast did a stellar job- sans Travolta- I remarked to my friend during the movie how terrible his acting was, jesus christ, that guy is a hack! My favorite performance was probably Salma Hayek. She looked like she was having a lot of fun with the role and I thought it was a cool twist to have a female crime boss. Del Toro obviously was excellent as well, and while the three leads didn't quite stack up to the Latin bombshell duo of Hayek/Del Toro, they held their own. Some of the dialogue was a bit unnatural at times (i.e. random conversations about Buddha) but I'll let it slide. It was the perfect gritty gangster movie I needed to see right now. The 130 minute running time flew by, I wasn't bored for a second. I know the ending sparked some controversy but I found it to be pretty fucking clever. Although the first ending was poetic, Shakespearean, romantic and (although depressing) a real crowd pleaser, it just doesn't always work out that way. Sometimes these people do get busted. So I did enjoy that twist, although maybe it could have been executed better. Now, I do have a question, at the end- is this all supposed to be some gay allegory/bromance story? There was hints at that all through the movie, and then at the end Othella says something along the lines of "there can never be equal love between three people" and you see Ben/Chon on the beach together and then O alone in a street market... If so it's just another different spin on the genre, and I like that effort to try something new.

8.5/10 (A-)

PS-

This movie made me want to do all of the following: smoke weed, snort cocaine, get drunk, fuck, travel, learn Spanish, kill someone.

Edited July 9, 2012 by The aDIM Legacy

[mattmav45]

My theater lost it when Del Toro greeted the bicycle cops in the park, that was classic.

[DAR]

Good movie to rent. B

[ecstasy]

The movie would have been much better with different actors playing the 3 lead roles. Taylor Kitsch, Aaron Johnson and Blake Lively acting was like in a Nickelodeon movie. However, Travolta, Hayek and Del Toro were pretty awesome in their roles. Blake's narration was grating. that's all I got. I loved the idea of the film but the 3 leads just took it way down.

 

Grade C

[JonnyCraig]

Eh. The first 20 minutes or so annoyed the hell out of me, then I dug it for about 90 minutes, and then it concluded with one of the most anti-climactic endings I have ever seen. If you're going to cop out, don't go with the 'false ending' trick. Even when you consider the film's exposition and terrible ending, this is still a return to form for Stone, with its flashes of brilliance reminding me of '90s Stone (the last time he had any consistency.) Lively annoyed the hell out of me, but I thought the rest of the cast was fine, with Travolta and Hayek's scene chewing being the highlight. It could've been so much more, but it is still the best Stone film since the rather underrated Any Given Sunday. C+

Edited August 17, 2013 by CarlosDanger