Tenderness is the story of a killer, an obsessed young girl and a tired-out cop in pursuit; it is also the latest chance for Oscar winner and former badass Russell Crowe to work on his worn out, tormented everyman routine… again. If you were to judge a movie on the opening ten minutes, this movie is absolutely terrible. As the story progresses it become abundantly clear that the director responsible for Hide and Seek and Swimfan has little or no intention of doing anything other than ensure as few people as possible will like this movie.
An interesting ploy, let’s see if it works out.
One of the main drawbacks of reviewing movies, or indeed studying them, is that you don’t choose what you watch, which leads to having to sit through films like Tenderness. I think it is safe to say that if Russell Crowe hadn’t signed on for this movie, no one would see it. Except maybe the people who have read the book from which it was adapted. I’ll take a wild guess and say that they don’t like the film as much as the book. No shock there then.
Tenderness tells the story of an entirely unconvincing “young psychopath” Eric Komenko (played by Jon Foster), who has been released from prison after serving a sentence for killing his parents. He is being monitored by Lt Cristofuoro (Russell Crowe) who is convinced that the killer will strike again, despite the young actor’s obvious aversion to showing any sort of skill or emotion in the role that would suggest he even committed the crimes he was in prison for in the first place. And with the almost too obvious burden of an ill wife to add to his torment, I’m shocked that Crowe’s character has the time to chase people around the country for no apparent reason other than that gut feeling that only worn out, tormented everyman characters in terrible movies get.
It should come as no surprise that the troubled and abused young girl we meet at the beginning of the film via the most rudimentary and basic of techniques, which include a shot of her walking along a train track after being sort of, but not really, abused at work, should end up joining up with the killer on the road and forming a bond with him. This follows the familiar pattern of the loner guy not wanting the girl to join him, but then eventually relenting and growing to care for her. The fact that this is adapted from a novel aimed at teenagers should have prevented me from expecting anything even remotely interesting, or well made. Although I didn’t spend money on this movie, I did spend approximately 97 valuable minutes of my life watching it and as the dramatic final scenes unfolded in the beautiful landscapes of New York State, I had my eyes on the horizon hoping and praying to see a gigantic mushroom cloud light the sky up and obliterate every character before the scheduled, post marked redemption scene that you can see coming from the first time you meet the two young characters. Psychological thriller by numbers is one way of describing it, and probably the nicest way.
Almost everything about this film annoys me, the tone, the acting, the script, the young actors… Well, all the actors except Crowe who gets a pass because he has made some classics, but really should have exercised better judgement here. Maybe I am being unfairly harsh on Tenderness and it’s stars. It is easy to sit at a computer and heap praise or criticism on something that someone has bled over. The film is not all bad, the photography is very good, creating suspense and atmosphere where the actors fail to. It is, however, filled with teenage angst, which I am a little old to really get, or indeed keep a straight face through. Crowe was obviously filling time around the making of Robin Hood. He should count himself lucky that he has such a big film coming out, otherwise people might actually remember this film.
Tenderness: Something definitely stinks...
If you still want to watch it. It will be released on the 26th of April and will cost £15.99. Alternatively I could come round your house and you can pay me to act out the entire story with empty drinks cans, I’m sure it will convey the same emotion as watching the film and I will have it wrapped in less time so you can do something productive with your life.
[rating:1/5]
With The Hurt Locker being the first war film to be awarded the Best Picture Oscar in nearly 25 years (the last war film to earn the academy’s top honour was Platoon in 1986) we count down the top 5 war films to have been overlooked and forgotten about in recent years. (more…)
