Seven Psychopaths Review

                Unfortunately, not that many films are truly unpredictable anymore. All of the five original plots that have ever existed have been used and reused to the point of irrelevance. So what is there left to surprise an audience? You can insert complete absurdity and nonsense, breaking from the natural flow of your story with non-sequiturs and narrative tangents. Your other option is to address the clichés in your own movie and subvert them—which admittedly has become a cliche in and of itself. Irish filmmaker Martin McDonagh has decided to use both of these methods with his second feature film “Seven Psychopaths”.

                In 2008 McDonagh released his first full length feature called “In Bruges”, starring Collin Farrell, Brendon Gleason and Ralph Fiennes. It was a modest euro-crime-comedy but it showed a lot of strength in McDonagh’s abilities to write good characters and captivating dialogue, resulting in an Oscar nomination for best original screenplay.  Here in “Seven Psychopaths”, McDonagh takes on the pressure to satisfy the expectations of his first impression head-on. This sophomore effort is the product of another crackling script full of the same kind of post-Tarantino/Post-Guy Ritchie moments that we loved the first time around. What changes is he has now written himself into the script and we are asked to question if the things we are seeing are really happening or if they are just the manifestations of McDonagh’s writers-block. 

                The story--at least the most simplified version of it—is about an Irishman named Martin, played by Collin Farrell, who is living in L.A. with an eccentric con man named Billy, played by Sam Rockwell. While trying to figure out how to start a script he has already sold (also called “Seven Psychopaths”) Billy and his partner-in-crime Hans, played by Christopher Walken, begin to prepare for a battle with a dangerous mobster, played by Woody Harrelson, whose beloved shih-tzu they have kidnapped.  At the same time all of this is going on, we are taken into several out-of-context scenes within the script Farrell’s character is trying to craft, and we spend some time within the headspace of the brutal and unsavory characters that occupy his work in progress. As the story progresses the film starts to merge with the film-within-the-film as the concurrent narratives cross and interweave.

                As you can already tell from my synopsis, this movie isn’t too self-conscious about being self-referential. The word “meta” has been used to describe this kind post-modern writing style, while others might just call it self-indulgent and sycophantic.  Both opinions would be correct. The truth is, a lot of this movie is simply throwing everything at the wall—including the kitchen sink—just to see what sticks, fortunately, most of it does. Unlike the streamlined treatment for McDonagh’s “In Bruges” this is not a screenplay that I would ever call tight. In fact I dare call it a bit flabby and unfocused. But it certainly takes a lot of risks and its rewards are all the more fulfilling because of it.

                Even if all of its disparate elements don’t exactly hang together, you can’t deny this movies sheer audaciousness and its ability to shock and entertain you.  The performances all across the board are among each actors best work and everyone has their scene or two to shine, including smaller stand out performances from Tom Waits, Harry Dean Stanton and Linda Bright Clay. Also, the outdoor cinematography is thoughtful and individual scenes and set-pieces are creative and well shot. Most importantly, “Seven Psychopaths” is consistently funny and surprising. Though the movie is making up its own rules, you can never predict where it’s going and by the time it’s over, you feel like you have been taken on a wild ride by a driver who might be as psychopathic as the characters he has conceived.

Grade: B

Originally Published by The Basic Alternative/Nov-2012