Release Date:
05/15/2009
Directed by: Rian Johnson
The Skinny: Two brothers who have been running scams since they were this high (Mark Ruffalo and Adrien Brody) set their sites on a rich, lonely shut-in with enough personal quirks to fill an entire indie film festival (Rachel Weisz).
The Good: Remember the old Kids in the Hall sketch where Dave Foley's self-proclaimed "bad doctor" says "How far can you coast on charm? Well, pretty far, it turns out." That's an apt way to sum up Brothers Bloom. It's a tad too in love with its own cuteness and it lifts so much from Wes Anderson that a Wilson brothers cameo would seem perfectly at home, but it still manages to be mostly winning thanks to its understated sense of humor and, well, its charm. Especially when Weisz is introduced—she is the movie's true heart and soul (although Ruffalo and Brody have a nice, uneasy chemistry) and you'll instantly go doe-eyed for her. And when the movie aims for laughs, it mostly hits.
The Bad: The movie falters in its final act, when it tries to inject seriousness and meaning into what has previously been a light, whimsical romp. And the movie's mysterious "villain" is not only a step too far into camp (what is he? A gypsy pirate?) but his purpose and storyline could be completely chopped out of the movie and it wouldn't suffer at all. In fact, it might improve in some ways.
Kiss, Kiss, Bang, Bang: She may have been sprung wholesale out of "Male Fantasy 101," but Rinko Kikuchi's mute explosives expert Bang Bang—the brothers' "muscle"—is, for lack of a more articulate term, really cool.
Theater, DVD, or TNT in five years? With its surprising globe-trotting scale, Brothers Bloom looks great on a big screen, but it'll play OK on DVD, too.
The Skinny: Two brothers who have been running scams since they were this high (Mark Ruffalo and Adrien Brody) set their sites on a rich, lonely shut-in with enough personal quirks to fill an entire indie film festival (Rachel Weisz).
The Good: Remember the old Kids in the Hall sketch where Dave Foley's self-proclaimed "bad doctor" says "How far can you coast on charm? Well, pretty far, it turns out." That's an apt way to sum up Brothers Bloom. It's a tad too in love with its own cuteness and it lifts so much from Wes Anderson that a Wilson brothers cameo would seem perfectly at home, but it still manages to be mostly winning thanks to its understated sense of humor and, well, its charm. Especially when Weisz is introduced—she is the movie's true heart and soul (although Ruffalo and Brody have a nice, uneasy chemistry) and you'll instantly go doe-eyed for her. And when the movie aims for laughs, it mostly hits.
The Bad: The movie falters in its final act, when it tries to inject seriousness and meaning into what has previously been a light, whimsical romp. And the movie's mysterious "villain" is not only a step too far into camp (what is he? A gypsy pirate?) but his purpose and storyline could be completely chopped out of the movie and it wouldn't suffer at all. In fact, it might improve in some ways.
Kiss, Kiss, Bang, Bang: She may have been sprung wholesale out of "Male Fantasy 101," but Rinko Kikuchi's mute explosives expert Bang Bang—the brothers' "muscle"—is, for lack of a more articulate term, really cool.
Theater, DVD, or TNT in five years? With its surprising globe-trotting scale, Brothers Bloom looks great on a big screen, but it'll play OK on DVD, too.
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