Review of The Town (2010) by T-Pity — 18 Sep 2010

At times stylish, sometimes well-acted, and mostly nicely filmed, "The Town," in the end, left me a bit flat and disappointed. What was missing? Well, I don't know for sure. I think a lack of focus contributed to the sense of incompleteness.

Too many issues, some only partially resolved. Mostly I was entertained and the grainy, gritty texture of the cinematography lifted my expectations for the underlying story. But instead of a tight, cohesive beginning-to-end tale of a hardened criminal trying to rise above his circumstances, the storytelling sprawled across the screen in a series of loosely connected scenes and performances that eventually, like Ben Affleck's Doug, just left.

It's a credit to Affleck's somewhat surprising ability as director/actor that this stew stays together at all. Not a bad picture, at all, but the bones were there to deliver something much, much better.