When I sat through the opening quarter of Masters Down, I assumed that my biggest obstacle would be its plot formula and neglected characters. But when I was acting, I felt that I gradually realized that I would have much bigger problems. The further it goes, the more convoluted and plausible it becomes, until finally it descends into a heavy and repetitive set of theatrical devices. This is not a bad movie, but it is bad. It is structured in such a way that it changes every year; just as we think about what will happen when we know it, the story turns to something else and ends up being about something else entirely. This happened more than once. In time, I knew the mystery was solved, but I no longer knew which clues were vital and which were simply red herrings. It’s annoying, I think, to be talented films.
The central character is David Callahan (Stephen-dorff), a detective for the police at Port Bridge. His story unfolds as a recklessly convoluted series of back-to-back current events and out-of-sequence flashbacks. What we know right off the bat is that he is a recovering alcoholic and drug addict who sobered up after being shot by an anonymous good samaritan at the office and rescued. When he is sitting in the bar, Diet Coke is sitting in the place immediately next to the hand shot, is to be approached by a Russian man. He tells Callahan that his name is Sergei Dronov (Zoran Radanovich), and that he is a good Samaritan. In the end, Callahan offers himself, not because he wants to be thanked, but because he needs a handle to take on a private case, namely to track down and bring to justice the man who drove his daughter to her death.
Dronov gives his daughter’s Journal to Callahan. The story, elegantly written in feminine truths and scrubs, is intricately woven into the story of a woman who just wanted to make something of herself for her immigrant parents, who sacrificed everything for her. To saved her way through college, she worked as a bootlegger – as it turns out, the very same one. the club Callahan used to frequent in the days of the deviants. At length she was attacked by the indecency of a man, who was seen alone, and would draw her pictures, and others of the stippers, on the cocktail maps; In addition to the trauma of the experience, she was racked with guilt over not reporting the incident and taking steps toward not letting the attacker hurt another girl. She end life slipped on her lip and fell into prescription pills.
The more Callahan investigates, the more it becomes apparent that all is not as it seems. This is true not only of Dronov’s daughter, but also of the alleged attacker, a man named Logue (Walton Goggins), of Royce Walker (Dominic Purcell), who owns a strip club, of Callahan’s fences, and even of the night. Callahan was wounded and rescued. As he proclaims, he unleashes a whole new series of personal and professional setbacks, all of which play into the film’s obvious theme of forgiveness and redemption. It is possible to sift through all the information sent to us and send an explanation, but it takes a lot of work, more than most listeners can do and/or are willing to do. Although an attempt is made, it can be found that the sequence of events and subsequent revelations is too effective for a good film. In a way, it becomes less about the narrative and more about the plot – about finding ways to make the film as vague and dramatic as possible.
Whatever problems this movie has, the actors can’t be blamed for them. They do nothing more or less than what the screenplay requires of them, and they do it quite well. This is true even of more stereotypical roles. This should include a bored police officer with a hidden agenda (James Woods), a wise-cracking detective (David Boreanaz), and a good priest with an Irish brogue (Tommy Flanagan), who is given nothing but to do, comforts Callahan in times of deep introspection. And there is something pathetically true about Dorff’s performance, even though he is at the mercy of the plot. He certainly looks like a cop who has seen better days; with his untidy hair, unshorn face, and worn and loose clothing loosely quartered, he looks as if a man had lost everything in the extreme.
The funniest scene actually has nothing to do with it. They involve Callahan and his relationship with his wife (Elisabeth Röhm) and teenage daughter (Beatrice Miller), this surprisingly realistic; one minute rolling his eyes at his father because he was such a father, the next hesitatingly trying to take his advice, and after that moment he cries out to him for being too careful. It is not to be said that there are no spots in Minister Down. The film is clearly well-intentioned. However, it is too clumsily structured, and the plot and characters are ultimately sacrificed in favor of the expected drama, not the least of which is the shootout in the final act. Each part is inexplicable in the title cards projected on the screen before the end of the credits, which summarizes the fate. whose characters This is typically done only in biopics or historical dramas. Why does director Brian A. Miller want us to believe his movie is based on a true story?
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