Movie Notes: Changing Lanes
= 3 stars
Starring Ben Affleck, Samuel Jackson, Toni Collette
Directed by Roger Michell
Synopsis
Lawyer Gavin Banek (Ben Affleck) gets in a car accident with Doyle Gipson (Samuel Jackson). Instead of doing the right thing, he hastily drives off, forgetting an important files folder. With Doyle in possession of the folder, the two men begin a morally questionable game of blackmail, largely as an outlet for intense pressures in their personal lives.
The Good
- Sam Jackson is convincing as a beat-down fellow about to lose his sons and can’t catch a break.
- The cartoony one-upmanship is reasonably entertaining, as I began to guess what extremes the characters would go to next. Actually, it might have worked better as a dark comedy.
- There’s a decent supporting cast filling in the gaps, most notably Toni Colette and Sidney Pollack as co-workers at Gavin’s law practice.
The Bad
- Ben Affleck doesn’t seem up to this role. Several moments occurred where I felt he should have been more unhinged, yet Affleck seems to unconsciously hold back. As a result, some of the movie’s final scenes where Gavin should be coming to life-altering realizations seem like nothing of the sort.
- The philosophical musings on whether people are basically good or evil is rather missing the point — it’s more the decisions people make — whether they’re self-serving or take others into consideration.
Conclusion
Despite Ben Affleck not convincing enough as a pissed-off lawyer, I did get caught up in the movie and was curious to see how it would all work out. It was easily worth the special, iTunes $0.99 rental fee.
IMDB: Changing Lanes
Wikipedia: Changing Lanes
Rotten Tomatoes: Changing Lanes 78%
After having seen “Gone, Baby, Gone,” I’ve amended my position on Ben Affleck. He’s truly a sucky actor, but he does certainly seem to have considerable merit behind the camera where you can’t see that snarky grin — y’know, the one that you’d like to slap clean off of his smug face… So, let’s keep him in the director’s chair!
His brother Casey, however, is shaping up to be quite a fine actor! And of course his brother-from-another-mother Matt Damon, is awesome!
Hmmm, I’ll add Gone Baby Gone to my Netflix. There is one item Ben acted pretty well in, the infamous viral video with Jimmy Kimmel