by Jillian Butler, Ampersandology
Recently, as the press for Ben Affleck's new directorial feature The Town ramped into high gear, his longtime friend and sometime cohort Matt Damon was quoted as saying that Affleck seems posed to mimic the career of another Hollywood great:
Only time will really tell, but I think Damon may be on to something here; as an actor, Ben Affleck is nothing spectacular. Serviceable, yes: he's done the bland romantic comedies and requistie action flicks, enjoying solid to moderate succeess. But as a performer, he's become somewhat more notorious for his associations offscreen: the aforementioned friendship with Damon, his high-profile flings with Gwenyth Paltrow, Jennifer Lopez and now-wife Jennifer Garner.
His leading man status always seemed, to me at least, a little like something the public needed to be constantly reminded of, rather than naturally assumed. And I think it's significant that the bona fide success in his career has been for a role he assumed behind the camera: his shared Oscar with Matt Damon in 1999 for the script Good Will Hunting. So it seems to make his gradual shift from screen vision to visionary a natural, if inherited, title.
Overall, The Town is a solid effort, and that's really both the best and the worst that can be said about it: it's not as electrifying, brittle or surprising as his 2007 directorial debut Gone Baby Gone, but it's another strong entry into the career that Affleck's building for himself as the guy behind the camera. It's filled with the same sophomore mistakes that most artists who knock it out of the park on the first go usually suffers: a sloppy third act resolution, too much reliance on the theatrics of gunplay and 'splosions, and a drop of stunt casting (see: Lively, Blake, who is about as convincing as a hard-shelled junkie as a teenage girl wobbling around in her mother's borrowed shoes and heavy makeup while home alone).
But it gets so much more right. For the most part, the casting is enviable and proves why its pays to have good Hollywood pedigree. Jeremy Renner earns his accolades just by showing up these days, because what he brings to the table is so sublime: his Jim is a sociopath, a bad dog that needs to be put down but gets off on glimpses of a fragile humanity. Rebecca Hall continues to win at life, playing the onetime hostage of a bank robbery and walking the delicate line between 'smart and capable' and 'fragile innocent'. Affleck, too, probably turns in one of his better performances in years. And Jon Hamm is there too! And Pete Postlethwaite! AND Chris Cooper!
Perhaps the most interesting idea in the film comes before the action even starts, with a placard that suggests one neighborhood in Boston -- Charlestown-- has produced the most bank robbers than any other American neighborhood in history, to the point it became something of a familial legacy--in other words, fathers handing over their mantel to sons and brothers becoming cohorts in the "family" business. That's a ripe concept, and it's something that Affleck (wisely) doesn't linger on; a lesser filmmaker would have relied on the neighborhood's reflexive mythology to infuse his characters with pathos and tragedy. But Affleck's not making a social problem film, and instead allows his story --and the corners he paints his characters into well before they notice their prison-- to cash in the promise of that ghostly inheritance.
North American Premiere
Recently, as the press for Ben Affleck's new directorial feature The Town ramped into high gear, his longtime friend and sometime cohort Matt Damon was quoted as saying that Affleck seems posed to mimic the career of another Hollywood great:
In a lot of ways, I always think of Clint [Eastwood], because Clint was doing orangutan movies, and people weren’t taking him as seriously. And look at the second half of his career. He’s an icon. And I really feel like that’s the kind of career Ben’s going to have.
Only time will really tell, but I think Damon may be on to something here; as an actor, Ben Affleck is nothing spectacular. Serviceable, yes: he's done the bland romantic comedies and requistie action flicks, enjoying solid to moderate succeess. But as a performer, he's become somewhat more notorious for his associations offscreen: the aforementioned friendship with Damon, his high-profile flings with Gwenyth Paltrow, Jennifer Lopez and now-wife Jennifer Garner.
His leading man status always seemed, to me at least, a little like something the public needed to be constantly reminded of, rather than naturally assumed. And I think it's significant that the bona fide success in his career has been for a role he assumed behind the camera: his shared Oscar with Matt Damon in 1999 for the script Good Will Hunting. So it seems to make his gradual shift from screen vision to visionary a natural, if inherited, title.
Overall, The Town is a solid effort, and that's really both the best and the worst that can be said about it: it's not as electrifying, brittle or surprising as his 2007 directorial debut Gone Baby Gone, but it's another strong entry into the career that Affleck's building for himself as the guy behind the camera. It's filled with the same sophomore mistakes that most artists who knock it out of the park on the first go usually suffers: a sloppy third act resolution, too much reliance on the theatrics of gunplay and 'splosions, and a drop of stunt casting (see: Lively, Blake, who is about as convincing as a hard-shelled junkie as a teenage girl wobbling around in her mother's borrowed shoes and heavy makeup while home alone).
But it gets so much more right. For the most part, the casting is enviable and proves why its pays to have good Hollywood pedigree. Jeremy Renner earns his accolades just by showing up these days, because what he brings to the table is so sublime: his Jim is a sociopath, a bad dog that needs to be put down but gets off on glimpses of a fragile humanity. Rebecca Hall continues to win at life, playing the onetime hostage of a bank robbery and walking the delicate line between 'smart and capable' and 'fragile innocent'. Affleck, too, probably turns in one of his better performances in years. And Jon Hamm is there too! And Pete Postlethwaite! AND Chris Cooper!
Perhaps the most interesting idea in the film comes before the action even starts, with a placard that suggests one neighborhood in Boston -- Charlestown-- has produced the most bank robbers than any other American neighborhood in history, to the point it became something of a familial legacy--in other words, fathers handing over their mantel to sons and brothers becoming cohorts in the "family" business. That's a ripe concept, and it's something that Affleck (wisely) doesn't linger on; a lesser filmmaker would have relied on the neighborhood's reflexive mythology to infuse his characters with pathos and tragedy. But Affleck's not making a social problem film, and instead allows his story --and the corners he paints his characters into well before they notice their prison-- to cash in the promise of that ghostly inheritance.
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