Wolfs plus Short Takes on some other cinematic topics
Reviews and Comments by Ken Burke
I invite you to join me on a regular basis to see how my responses to current cinematic offerings compare to the critical establishment, which I’ll refer to as either the CCAL (Collective Critics at Large) if they’re supportive or the OCCU (Often Cranky Critics Universe) when they go negative. However, due to COVID concerns I’m mostly addressing streaming options with limited visits to theaters, where I don’t think I’ve missed much anyway, though better options may be on the horizon. (Note: Anything in bold blue [some may look near purple] is a link to something more in the review.)
My reviews’ premise: “You can’t please everyone, so you got to please yourself.”
(from "Garden Party" by Rick Nelson and the Stone Canyon Band, 1972 album of the song’s name)
9/25/2024—As the Northern Hemisphere’s transitioned into autumn I’ll need to note to all present and future readers of Film Reviews from Two Guys in the Dark that my wife, Nina, and I have transitioned into our mid-70s which puts us in the autumn of our years too (winter’s a long way off we’re convinced), which means it’s now taking us longer to get do our daily tasks so some changes are now necessary; for me that means putting more time into meals—shopping/preparation—as time management requires me to cut down on the weekly hours I’ve been devoting to this blog. There will still be postings on a weekly basis (most of the time), but the reviews will need to be considerably shorter, maybe with fewer Musical Metaphors if trying to figure out what to use becomes too much of a challenge. I’ll focus on successfully getting to the point in what I write, but extra details and tangents will have to be curtailed. (Damn!) Comments on this revised format are always welcomed.
Wolfs (Jon Watts) rated R 108 min.
Here’s the trailer:
(Use the full screen button in the image’s lower right to enlarge its size;
activate the same button or use “esc” keyboard key to return to normal.)
If you can abide plot spoilers read on, but this blog’s intended for those who’ve seen the film or want to save some $ (as well as recognizing those readers like me who just aren’t that tech-savvy). To help any of you who want to learn more details yet avoid these all-important plot-reveals I’ll identify any give-away sentences/sentence-clusters with colors plus arrows:
⇒The first and last words will be noted with arrows and red.⇐ OK, now continue on if you prefer.
If you remember Harvey Keitel’s role in Pulp Fiction (Quentin Tarantino, 1994), you know what a “cleaner” is regarding erasing evidence of a homicide or any other sort of dubious death; further, if you’ve been remembering how screen-effective the pairing of George Clooney and Brad Pitt were in the Ocean’s Eleven (Steven Soderbergh, 2001), … Twelve (Soderbergh, 2004), and … Thirteen (Soderbergh, 2007) franchise—along with a lot of other great stars in all of these movies—with hopes of seeing them together again, then you’ll likely easily connect with Wolfs (not a typo, despite the normal plural being “wolves,” but maybe this title refers to how independent of each other these characters are initially so you wouldn’t expect to see them working/hunting together, that is until circumstances convince them they need to join forces against mutual-danger). What we have is Manhattan District Attorney Margaret (Amy Ryan) spending a night in a plush hotel, picking up an attractive young man (known only as The Kid [Austin Abrams]) for a one-night-stand, then horrified when he’s jumping on the bed, bounces onto a glass tabletop, shatters it, seems to be horribly dead.
Frantic, she looks through her phone contacts, finds a number a friend has given her for a “fixer,” just the kind of clandestine operative she now desperately needs, so soon a guy known only to us as Margaret’s Man (Clooney) arrives, starts to get to work to remove the body along with any sense this young man (or Clooney) was ever in the room (she’s likely OK as she booked the place under a false name, is fairly sure no one she knows saw her earlier in the evening). However, a guy simply known as Pam’s Man (Pitt) suddenly arrives, functioning as a fixer for the owner of the hotel, Pamela Dowd-Henry (Frances McDormand [just a voice on the phone]), who was aware of the situation because of surveillance cameras in the suite. The men argue over who’s in charge here, until Pitt convinces secretive Clooney he doesn’t want to be revealed on what’s sure to be footage from the cameras. They give Margaret a change of clothes (hers are rather bloody), send her home, then haul The Kid down to the parking garage where they’re shocked to find him alert, as he had just been drugged—he wasn't dead—with a mysterious substance (even hid his pulse) somehow earlier.
Further, in the suite they found a suitcase of drugs he must have brought in, a dangerous cargo because it was recently stolen from the Albanian Mafia; The Kid gets fully conscious, tries to run away in a great chase scene, but is caught by the fixers. He tells them the location for drug delivery will be sent to a pager at a club, so off they all go. The Kid gets the pager, but the fixers get caught up in a wedding reception run by Croatian mobster Dimitri (Ziatko Burić), who originally stole the drug shipment. Kid and fixers go to the planned drug drop, only to find a shootout between Albanians and Dimitri’s thugs where all are killed. ⇒The fixers take The Kid home, have breakfast next morning at a diner where they first realize how similar they are, followed by understanding how they both were set up to be killed in this convoluted plot; the movie ends with them seeing a half-dozen hitmen waiting outside, so they plan to shoot first, finally exchange names if they survive.⇐ I’ve already noted several movies Wolfs has vague allusions to, with that last scene clearly referencing Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (George Roy Hill, 1969), although what comes of this story may be of a different nature than how we assume those long-ago outlaws have ended up.
At times this plot gets considerably more complicated (plus not being fully clarified when it’s all done) than Butch …, but it’s still an active, enjoyable mess as long as you don’t mind encountering a bunch of dead bodies along the way, with Clooney and Pitt as embraceable as ever, delivering some marvelous dialogue as they bicker through most of their adventures. The CCAL is reasonably (but not wildly) supportive with the Rotten Tomatoes positive reviews at 68%, the Metacritic average score at 60%. If this sounds like a possibility for you, you’ll likely have to turn to streaming (had a limited theatrical release September 20, 2024, probably not easily found now) where it’s available on the Apple TV+ platform (if you’re not a subscriber, you can watch their holdings for 7 days free, then it’s $9.99 monthly if you choose to stay). While you’re deciding whether to see it or not, I’ll leave you with my usual tactic of a Musical Metaphor (but there are more to be found farther below, with other items) which will be what’s in the movie to accompany the final credits, Bill Withers’ “Just the Two of Us” (on the 1980 Winelight album) at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uw5OLnN7UvM, which is a bit of silliness to close that tale as Clooney and Pitt's characters make a peace-pact as the song tells us (and them) “We can make it if we try,” so—to paraphrase a line from Casablanca (Michael Curtiz, 1942), I’ll use it also for my own silliness because “You played it for them, I can play it for me!”
SHORT TAKES
As noted last week, I may sometimes put items in SHORT TAKES unrelated to cinematic topics, such as this one about the end of the line for the baseball team known as the Oakland Athletics (1968-2024; originated in Philadelphia 1901-1954, moved to Kansas City 1955-1967); the team will still exist, but their despicable owner, John Fisher (of The Gap family fortune), is moving them out of Oakland to play for at least 3 years in a minor-league facility in West Sacramento, CA while their new stadium is being built (supposedly) in Las Vegas, NV; their final game at the Oakland Coliseum was on Thursday, 9/26/2024, where they won 3-2 over last year’s World Series champs, the Texas Rangers before a sellout crowd of over 48,000 (then went to Seattle for their final games as an Oakland team, lost all 3 of them). I’ve been attending their Coliseum games on an annual basis (except during the COVID lockout in 2020) since 1987 when Nina encouraged me to take in a game as she’d been a fan ever since they moved to the San Francisco Bay Area, even knew some of the players. I’ve got a lot of good memories of the team, the ballpark, and some dramatic wins (including Game 2 of the 1989 World Series over the SF Giants; the final game of their record-setting 20-game win streak; an 18-inning afternoon marathon where they finally beat the NY Yankees). It’s very hard to see this team go, even as they’ve been struggling so much in recent years as cheapskate Fisher kept trading away outstanding players just to keep their payroll at or close to the lowest in the major leagues (while raising ticket and parking prices). The team always lauded the fans, though, even when there were fewer than 5,000 in attendance. So, one last time on behalf of the A’s I’ll offer a Musical Metaphor of "Take Me Out to the Ballgame," led by a video of famed Chicago Cubs announcer Harry Caray (who had a brief stint with the A’s; his great-grandson Chris Caray joined the A’s broadcast team this past season) at a "Field of Dreams" game at the ballpark made famous by the movie of that name (Phil Alden Robinson, 1989). Sad to say, “That’s all, folks!”
Speaking of Nina Kindblad—as I’ve often done in this blog—I’d like to wish her a Happy Birthday (none of your business how many she’s celebrated) which occurs somewhere around now, but given the ripoffs hackers manage to achieve I’m not helping any of them by providing a date or even a current photo of her (both of us have recently been notified certain of our info has popped up on the Dark Web—no problems, though, at least yet—so I’ll keep them guessing as long as I can). Instead, I’ll give you this photo of Neil Young (accompanied by the band Promise of the Real, fronted by 2 of Willie Nelson’s sons) from the second weekend of the Desert Trip Festival, October 11, 2016, where we were in attendance to hear Neil sing our signature song, "Harvest Moon," offered to her here as another Musical Metaphor for the 37 years we’ve been together (married for 34 of them) because, my dear, “I’m still in love with you” (always will be) and continue to appreciate all you’ve had to put up with me, including those previous hours I’ve spent pounding away on keyboard keys for this blog when I could have been watching “Downton Abbey” with you (RIP to Maggie Smith, from both of us).
As long as we’re acknowledging RIPs, let’s also have one for Kris Kristofferson who now leaves Willie Nelson as the only surviving member of the once-supergroup, The Highwaymen, with Kristofferson, Nelson, Waylon Jennings, and Johnny Cash. I’ll keep this brief, as I realize all of these SHORT TAKES inclusions are pushing my posting back into time-consuming length (for all of us), but the events of some weeks call for such. So, I’ll close out with one more Metaphor, one of Kris’ best (with so many to pick from), “Me And Bobbie McGee” (1970 Kristofferson album) at https:// www.youtube.com/watch?v=ahpIirW0svY; I guess Janis Joplin’s version may be more soulful, but let’s give credit here to the original songwriter/performer. OK, enough additions; let’s finish up this rambling posting as I'll try to get more concise next week (please wish me well; it's not an easy task).
Related Links Which You Might Find Interesting:
Options to consider: (1) IMDb's 5 Things to Watch on the week of 9/30/2024 (I can’t say I agree with these recommendations, but that's just me; take a look); (2) What's new on Netflix in October 2024; (3) What's new on Paramount+ in October 2024; (4) What's new on Max in October 2024; (5) What's new on Disney+ in October 2024; and then (6) What's new on Hulu in October 2024.
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