Criminal Activities

Jackie Earle Haley – 2015 – USA 

With a lamely generic title and a screenplay mysteriously attributed – (according to IMDb) – to the late Poet Laureate Robert Lowell, Criminal Activities is also mysteriously directed by first-timer Jackie Earle Haley.  We are accustomed to actors displaying little artistic vision when they decide to direct, but – to compensate – they at least often demonstrate a sensitivity for dealing with their fellow actors.  I was surprised to find that Haley doesn’t show that aptitude at all.  The film is the same smart-assed, terminally clever caper film that has been made many times by young film school grads aping the affects of Pulp Fiction (1994) or The Usual Suspects (1995); not the least bit concerned that their pretensions will be painfully transparent even if they work, which they rarely do.  Despite the presence of some good actors (like Michael Pitt and Dan Stevens) and even a star (John Travolta), every scene seems curiously amateurish in its staging and performance.  Since Robert Lowell died in 1977, the blame for the film’s many problems can only be laid at director Haley’s doorstep.  The extremely familiar plot has four 20-something “friends,” who seem to have nothing in common with each other and no chemistry at all, caught up in a money-making scheme that gets them involved with kidnapping and the mob.  Its violence and histrionic dialogue are supposed to be funny most of the time… but then sometimes not; you know, exactly like Tarantino.