Review of Powder Blue (2009) by Richard C — 09 May 2009

A film which I have been after for 6 months now after seeing the teaser trailers which with a wonderful soundtrack made me excited about this film. After first being shown in January 2008 at film festival it is finally seeing the light of day, bypassing the cinematic release and going straight to DVD. This has surprised me mainly due to the fact the film has a cast of A list stars such as Jessica Biel, Forest Whitaker and Ray Liotta to name a few.

This movie falls into the category of films which have been given the term 'hyperlink movies'. Films which consist of several small stories which are told in various orders throughout the film culminating in an ending which ties them altogether as part of a greater story arch. These films tend to play on human emotions and center around relationships between people who are from different worlds. A film most people will know of this genre is Crash and the lesser known The Air I Breath which like Powder Blue had a wonderful cast but went totally under the radar.

The movie centers around several Los Angelinos whoâ??s lives cross paths by chance on Christmas eve: an ex-priest (Forest Whitaker) searches for someone to help ease his pain, a shy mortician (Eddie Redmayne) forms a bond with a damaged stripper/single mom (Jessica Biel), and an aging ex-convict (Ray Liotta) attempts to reconnect with his past.

I felt Forest Whitakers character was pointless in the film as his character has little if no effect on the other characters and their developing story lines which makes me wonder why his character was there in the first place. None the less Whitaker as always give a great performance.

Sadly this film doesnâ??t succeed where Crash did so well a few years so, I fell with films like this a fine line of pretentiousness is walked and at time Powder Blue steps over it ruining what would of been a better film. With most of the story being predictable it takes away the element of surprise when a twist the plot occurs. Sadly most people wonâ??t remember this film for its story line, good acting or the message it is trying to get across but the film in which Jessica Biel finally took her clothes off and showed the world her tits.