DOUBLE AFFLECK TRIPLE DOUBLE FEATURE

TRIPLE 9  (2016)  ** 

Chiwetel Ejiofor runs a crew of bank robbers whose line-up is packed to the gills with dirty cops and ex-soldiers.  A Russian mob boss (Kate Winslet!) coerces them into pulling not one but two elaborate capers.  The first job isn’t exactly a cake walk, but the second is going to be damned near impossible.  Ejiofor finally decides the only way to distract the cops long enough to pull off the job is to kill one of their own.  That way, while the fuzz is out searching the streets in full force for a cop killer, the crew can be quietly pulling off their heist.

Triple 9 is buoyed by a great cast, but it’s completely undone by the lethargic pacing, unpleasant characters, and muddled plotting.  It tries to be this multilayered character piece sandwiched inside of a gritty caper movie, but it’s much too murky to really come together as such.  At times, it almost feels like the first draft of the screenplay was used.  While director John (Lawless) Hillcoat gets all the story beats down, he never takes the time to create realistic characters we care about.  Instead, we just get a bunch of terrific actors (including Anthony Mackie, Gal Gadot, and Clifton Collins, Jr.) stuck reciting plot-heavy dialogue.  

Casey Affleck does what he can with his underwritten role of the cop who is targeted for assassination.  Unfortunately, he’s never given an opportunity to become a character you can root for.  He’s just another pawn in the crew’s scheme.  

The unrecognizable Kate Winslet is a hoot as the Russian baddie.  She really sinks her teeth into the role.  Admittedly, there’s not a lot to chew on.

Woody Harrelson is the most fun as a wily, seasoned detective on the case. He gets along by acting as if he’s in an entirely different movie than the rest of the cast.  He’s so good, you’ll wish you were watching the movie he thinks he’s in. 

Harrelson gets the best line of the movie when he tells a bank manager “The monster has gone digital.  Beware what you Insta-Google-Tweet-Face.”

TRIPLE FRONTIER  (2019)  * ½ 

Ben Affleck, Oscar Isaac, Charlie Hunnam, and company are ex-military grunts with no discernable retirement plan.  Together, they pull a job down in South America to ice a bad guy and steal millions in cash.  Like every other robbery in movie history, it does not go as planned.  Soon, their greed gets the best of them and they wind up having to make their getaway across the Andes mountains with their stolen haul rapidly dwindling.

Despite a sturdy premise, Triple Frontier is curiously inert, shallow, and uninvolving.  It makes all its points without nuance or subtlety (Would it surprise you that there’s a scene in which the thieves become stuck in the freezing wilderness and have to burn the money to keep warm?) and takes its sweet time doing so.  In the right hands, this could’ve been The Treasure of the Sierra Madre for the PTSD era.  As it is, director J.C. (A Most Violent Year) Chandor approaches the material without much enthusiasm, and as a result, the plot never gains much traction or momentum.  The reveal of the money’s hiding spot is well done, but that’s about the only bright spot in an otherwise murky movie.

The film’s biggest sin is that it wastes a good cast who are saddled with underwritten characters.  Affleck and Isaac are able to briefly shine through on occasion, but the rest of the grunts are wholly interchangeable and unmemorable.  Even then, Affleck is underutilized, and Isaac looks bored some of the time.

The action is unsatisfying too.  One scene in particular features some dodgy CGI helicopter effects.  That sort of thing wouldn’t have cut the mustard on a theatrical release.  Since this went straight to Netflix, I guess they thought no one would notice.