Was Oliver stoned when he shot this?

From its very first seconds, Oliver Stone’s Savages advertises itself as a clever and ambitious piece of cinematography. Two hours later the credits wash over what looks like an expensive, unfocused mess. We are greeted by Lively’s honeyed voice promising to narrate the story exactly as it happened, and are then left to wonder she is in fact dead and narrating things from the hereafter. Nice twist, you think to yourself. The sad part is that the film is too oafish – and too busy toying with new combinations of torture, telecommunication and betrayal on a backdrop of Mexican drug dynasties – to deliver anything but the bare bones of a story.

Based on a 2010 novel by Don Winslow, Savages introduces us to the ‘good guys’ Ben and Chon (Taylor-Johnson, Nowhere Boy, and Kitch, John Carter) – though a normal person would likely consider them cynical and narcissistic low-lives. Ben is a pseudo-idealist and former botany student. Chon, his ‘business partner’, is an ex-Navy SEAL who passes his war traumas off as macho fearlessness. They share a mansion on Laguna Beach, California – and a hot girlfriend (Lively), apparently underlining the general theme of ethical darkness. This private slice of heaven is paid for by 15 million reportedly enthusiastic dope smokers worldwide. Ben and Chon, we learn, have developed the most splendiferous cannabis known to man.

When a Mexican drug cartel (seeing Hayek and a charismatic Del Toro in central roles) decides it wants a share of the high-end weed market, a game of violent negotiation, kidnapping and torture breaks out. There are exciting moments, and some will enjoy Travolta as a crooked DEA cop, but the dialogue is wooden and the villains stereotypical.

Primed for something epic, though, you spend the better part of two hours waiting patiently for some kind of redeeming surprise, like an inspired plot twist or something. Alas, it’s not to be. Savages looks consistently dazzling (except when intentionally sickening and morbid), but it has a heart of ‘Stone’ and ends bizarrely – with a heavy-handed Tarantino-esque flashback which, second time around, branches off into an alternative ending that is as unsatisfactory as the first.

Savages (15)

Dir: Oliver Stone; US action, 2012, 133 mins; Taylor Kitsch, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Blake Lively, John Travolta, Benicio Del Toro, Salma Hayek, Emile Hirsch
Premiered October 11
Playing nationwide

TOP STORIES

Connect club

Connect Club is your gateway to a vibrant programme of events and an international community in Denmark.

Sign up here

Career

  • How internationals can benefit from joining trade unions

    How internationals can benefit from joining trade unions

    Being part of a trade union is a long-established norm for Danes. But many internationals do not join unions – instead enduring workers’ rights violations. Find out how joining a union could benefit you, and how to go about it.

  • Internationals in Denmark rarely join a trade union

    Internationals in Denmark rarely join a trade union

    Internationals are overrepresented in the lowest-paid fields of agriculture, transport, cleaning, hotels and restaurants, and construction – industries that classically lack collective agreements. A new analysis from the Workers’ Union’s Business Council suggests that internationals rarely join trade unions – but if they did, it would generate better industry standards.

  • Novo Nordisk overtakes LEGO as the most desirable future workplace amongst university students

    Novo Nordisk overtakes LEGO as the most desirable future workplace amongst university students

    The numbers are especially striking amongst the 3,477 business and economics students polled, of whom 31 percent elected Novo Nordisk as their favorite, compared with 20 percent last year.

Want to advertise your job with CPH Post?

Contact us

Jobs