TrueJoshNight
Truly Dreadful Film
Senteur
As somebody who had not heard any of this before, it became a curious phenomenon to sit and watch a film and slowly have the realities begin to click into place.
Ezmae Chang
This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.
Tobias Burrows
It's easily one of the freshest, sharpest and most enjoyable films of this year.
vchimpanzee
Josh is turning 18 and hanging out with a bad crowd. They do drugs, drive recklessly and even steal from the U. S. Mail. His brother Walter has been gone for a while and he comes back hoping to make amends for leaving the family. Josh has what seems like a brother-sister relationship with Bella, but he really wants Emily, a cop who is several years older.Josh's parents died when he was very young, and he was adopted by the Minnells. Walter (who has gone back to his original name Schmeiss) knows the full story, which Josh has never heard, and what happened to them may explain why both brothers turned out the way they did. 'The Maker' is the one who makes the rules in a given situation. Josh has that opportunity when he helps Walter and Felice in their 'transfer and storage' business. I think of the pleasant character from 'What the Deaf Man Heard' when I think of Matthew Modine. However, he can play bad guys too, and he made Walter likable and not really evil. As a con artist, Walter had to be quite a good actor too. I thought most of the lead actors gave good performances. Still, the movie was quite dark at times, and somewhat violent toward the end. Jonathan Rhys-Meyers effectively showed a young man having to make important moral decisions as he reached a point where he could have gone down the wrong road.It was a worthwhile film, if you like this sort of thing.
AlabamaWorley1971
Quirky intelligent little tale of a boy choosing between his foster parents' dream of college and his older brother's exciting life of crime. A lot of fun funky little touches. Pacing is slow, but it's quite interesting.
kteel
There were so many good things here -- interesting characters, good details (like the Minnell's perfect home being right next to an ugly industrial complex), and the potential for a nice dramatic movie about troubled brothers reuniting. The filmmakers had lots of good ideas and no way to weave them together into a coherent movie. Modine was sadly unconvincing as a bad guy, Madsen was an unnecessary scenery-chewing addition, and how Balk's character was written off was a crime. The scenes between Bella and Josh were the best. Jonathan Rhys Meyers was excellent! (He does a good American accent.) He brought a very genuine, believable feel to the character Josh. It's a shame the movie let him down by becoming increasingly implausible, and finally just a low-budget action climax cliche. Good cast & good ideas make this worth seeing.
HoTy
This is a really decent flick. Interesting story, well written, and well done. Jonathan Rhys-Meyers will evolve as one of the biggest new stars in the next couple of years. Great actor, great looking, beaucoup screen presence and personality.