Review: The Laundromat

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The Small Short.

When Ellen Martin's (Meryl Streep) husband dies in a boating accident, she expects a big pay out from the boat company's insurance policy. Only she finds out it's fraudulent and linked to a law firm in Panama ran by our narrators -  Jürgen Mossack (Gary Oldman) and Ramón Fonseca. (Antonio Banderas) 

Stephen Soderbergh apparently really liked The Big Short, because that's exactly what he's attempting to do here structure wise. Instead of the housing crisis,we have an insurance scam. It is well directed but the characters are not nearly as compelling as The Big Short, or most recently Hustlers to pull this type of film off. 

Before I watched this I had read some negative reviews that all talked about Streep, but it was Oldman and Banderas who I thought were completely insufferable. Oldman's accent is atrocious, he sounds like he's just trying to mimic Banderas so I was quite confused when his character mentions being from Germany. So we're stuck with annoying narrator who stay with us throughout, while all the interesting characters show up for 10 minutes, than disappear. They show how far and wide this scam goes. Taking us to Nevis, Panama, China, Los Angeles and introduce us to other characters that they promptly leave. 

Jeffrey Wright shows up to dodge a phone call, dodge a question, then get arrested. The biggest waste involves Nonso Anozie, Jessica Allain, Miracle Washington and Nikki Amuka-Bird.  Anozie plays Charles, a man who cheats on his wife (Amuka-Bird) with his daughter Simone's (Allian) friend Astrid. (Washington) Simone threatens to tell her mom, so Charles tries to bribe her with shares. It's the most engaging part of the movie, they get about 15-20 minutes of time, then we never see them again.  Nearly all the side stories are more interesting than the man one with Ellen.

I had low expectations going in, and this film was better than I expected, but it's nowhere near good.

Recommended: No

Grade: C

Memorable Quote: "How does he fucking do it?" - Simone (Jessica Allain)

Comments

  1. Candice FrederickOctober 21, 2019 at 8:37 AM

    yeah, it is really not good. i was also most engaged with the trinidadian family too, but i also liked rosalind chao's storyline. and ugh, oldman was so badly miscast and i hated his and banderas' characters (tho it's always nice to see banderas in a sharp suit)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Brittani BurnhamOctober 21, 2019 at 6:26 PM

      Like, how many German actors are there? You could've found one. I was spacing where Charles' family was located when I wrote this and I was too lazy to play it back and listen. lol

      Delete
  2. GeektellerOctober 21, 2019 at 9:31 AM

    I didn't like the movie, either, although I agree that the family storyline was the best and most engrossing. Overall, it's a mess of a script and I hated that they couldn't connect the storylines better. Mattias Schoenaerts's story was useless, for example

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Brittani BurnhamOctober 21, 2019 at 6:25 PM

      YES him too. I almost forgot he was in it consider he showed up to die after 3 minutes.

      Delete
  3. s.October 21, 2019 at 10:31 AM

    Oh man I am definitely skipping this. At least Streep won't be getting nominated for it....hopefully lol

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Brittani BurnhamOctober 21, 2019 at 6:24 PM

      She doesn't do anything of note. It would be pretty laughable if she got nominated for this.

      Delete
    2. s.October 22, 2019 at 1:38 AM

      I mean she usually does fuck all and they still nominate her lol

      Delete
    3. Brittani BurnhamOctober 22, 2019 at 12:00 PM

      True but usually she tries an accent along with it. lol

      Delete
  4. thevoid99October 21, 2019 at 8:23 PM

    I'll see this since it's Soderbergh as even mediocre Soderbergh is still better than films by lesser filmmakers.

    ReplyDelete
  5. keith71_98October 22, 2019 at 3:08 PM

    It's funny, I can completely see why people wouldn't like this. Yet, I kinda did. :)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Brittani BurnhamOctober 23, 2019 at 6:55 AM

      We keep ending up on different sides of the spectrum with these last few movies lol

      Delete
  6. BirgitOctober 23, 2019 at 1:48 PM

    I like Gary Oldman but not enough to see this. I am not a Streep fan and pray she doesn't get nominated. I also fear she does an accent because I find those roles the most annoying of hers

    ReplyDelete

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