Review of Savages (2012) by Amie D — 23 Jul 2013

Savages tells the story of a woman and her two boyfriends who run a successful drug business. The cops don't care, and their business really isn't that violent... that is until the Mexican drug cartel shows up and is like "you are going to come work for us, and if you say no we kill you." Naturally the two friends are like "No, fuck you." The cartel retaliates by kidnapping their girlfriend, now they must get her back.

So how did this film turn out? Is it as good as Platoon? Is it as bad as I hear Alexander was? Fuck no to the first one, and no to the second one. While it has its flaws, it still knows how to entertain you and even makes you think a little bit. The main characters are assholes, yet you actually want them to succeed and kill the asshole cartel boys, who are EVIL. Who each character represents is kind of left up to you, obviously Jon Travolta represents "The man" otherwise known as the United States (Which I sort of find insulting, yet it is kind of true. He, in all honesty is actually the best part of the film). I'm actually torn on the villainess in the movie (The leader of the cartel), you want to hate her because of all the horrible things she has done and yet her origin story makes you feel incredibly sympathetic towards her. The main characters, while I was interested in what happened to them, I was far more interested in what was happening to the villains.

The script here is sort of a mixed bag, the dialogue at times is so horrifyingly bad that you want to bang your head against a wall. Yet, at times it is also smart and well written. And as for the story, while it works it feels so drawn out despite it being as simple as it is. And as for the acting, it is for the most part really good and you can tell the people who played the villains had fun with their parts. The violence is also a mixed bag. At times, it is so extreme sometimes that it almost becomes one of the fucking Hostel movies, and I've made it clear how much I hate those. Yet, whenever the shooting starts the movie gets so much better and you start to forget the problems the movie has.

Savages is a good movie, but it most certainly is not a great movie. Yet, it is also a welcome return to form for Oliver Stone. It gets more right then it does wrong, but be warned: The film lives up to its title. Also the ending sucks.