FilmBlather.com

"The good hands at Allstate will choke you until your fucking eyes pop out."

What's a simple country hypercritic to do with something like Criminal, a step-by-step redo of an excellent film that was released here a mere two years ago? A film that I've seen twice and recall as a superlative genre exercise -- the best contemporary con thriller this side of David Mamet? A film too new to be updated and too universal to be translate?

No doubt recognizing this last, writer-director Gregory Jacobs (working with Steven Soderbergh under the pseudonym Sam Lowry) doesn't try to update or translate Fabian Bielinsky's Nine Queens, he simply makes it again, step by step; this is the closest thing to a filmic clone since Gus Van Sant's Psycho was ripped to threads by reviewers in 1998 -- and that one, at least, claimed the distinction of being in color, and an experiment. This one will justify its existence by insisting that you probably haven't seen Nine Queens.

So the task of reviewing Criminal is daunting. I can tell you that the material is strong enough to make it a good movie; an engaging movie. It's tight, exciting and clever, much like Nine Queens. Hell, it even has a few pleasures of its own: the translated dialogue is sharp, and the casting is positively inspired: John C. Reilly is an unlikely and brilliant choice for the role of the seasoned confidence game expert, and Diego Luna is just right to play the scrappy and sheepish amateur.

But... but... it's the same movie. I feel silly praising the cleverness of its plot and the effectiveness of its pacing -- it's a carbon copy of something I've just seen. I can begrudgingly recommend the film to those who've never seen the original, though I'd repeatedly advise them to go rent the original also/instead; I'm also comfortable telling fans of Nine Queens to check the film out as a curiosity, as it certainly doesn't disgrace its source or besmirch its memory. Hell, it doesn't even alter it.

I've never been an opponent of remakes, and I'm usually irritated at people who arrogantly ask "Why?" at the prospect of one, but this project just flummoxes me. If the people behind it thought that the story deserved to be seen by more people, then how about trying to give the original film some actual screen time? The decidedly low profile of this early fall release also seems to belie such an inspiration; no star power, minimal advertising, a very limited release by an indie distributor -- not exactly the recipe for a breakout success, though sleeperdom certainly isn't out of reach. As far as being a launching pad for the career of first-time director Jacobs, I'd think that he would have been better off crafting an original vision rather than a clone; even a more creatively assertive version of this story might have worked.

But hey, this is a good movie. It works in all the same ways Nine Queens worked -- except that film was its own original creation. Criminal is probably at your local multiplex, or perhaps at an arthouse a few miles away. Nine Queens is at your local video store. Which way will you go?