Another month, another instantly forgotten Nicolas Cage movie. He's rather subdued here, which is not why anyone bothers watching VOD-era Nic Cage, and on top of that, it's more of a TRAFFIC-style ensemble exercise that keeps him sidelined for long periods, and despite his top billing, he's playing a generally secondary character. Atypical of present-day Cage, this one also offers a lot more in the way of real actors, but the blatantly NARCOS-inspired storyline feels like it's trying to cram two seasons worth of a binge-worthy TV cartel drama into 100 interminable minutes that seem more like three hours. Written and directed by Jason Cabell, a former Navy SEAL who apparently worked with the DEA in Colombia prior to breaking into movies, RUNNING WITH THE DEVIL deals with the aftermath of the fentanyl and heroin overdose deaths of two suburban Seattle parents, with their young daughter getting on the school bus and telling the driver "I can't wake them up." This case is personal for The Agent in Charge (Leslie Bibb), who's also the little girl's aunt. It seems there's been a rash of fatal overdoses in and around Seattle, all traced back to a bad shipment that recently landed in the area. The Vancouver-based The Boss (Barry Pepper) assigns his top Seattle area distributor, a pizzeria owner known as The Cook (Cage) to get to the bottom of why shipments in his region have been light and overcut, and he assigns his top enforcer The Executioner (Cole Hauser) to accompany him to the base of operation in Colombia and follow the next shipment back to see where it's happening and who's responsible.
As you can see, everyone gets a title in lieu of a character name, an annoying quirk that seems more at home in a '90s post-Tarantino crime flick than it does in an ostensibly serious movie. There's also The Man (Laurence Fishburne), a sleazy, drug-addled, sex-addicted middleman who spends most of his time getting high with hookers (Fishburne gets possibly the least-dignified intro of his career, The Man first seen maniacally jerking off in a porn parlor peep show booth); The Snitch (Adam Goldberg), who gets busted snorting coke outside a hospital where he's about to dump off two dead hookers who OD'd on The Man's merchandise, and ends up an informant after being tortured by The Agent in Charge; Number One (Peter Facinelli), a DEA associate of The Agent; and The Farmer (Clifton Collins Jr), who's seen periodically in some Colombia-set scenes but his exact purpose in the narrative isn't really explained. It's Fishburne who gets the most screen time, giving RUNNING WITH THE DEVIL more than he can possibly get from it in return, rendering his efforts all for naught. I would understand it if this was like Cage's recent A SCORE TO SETTLE, which gave him Benjamin Bratt among the cast of relative nobodies (along with an amazing "BEEF?!" meltdown), but here we have another Cage clunker that's somehow packed with established actors of various standing for no reason at all. Cage stopped caring a long time ago and seems to be content lucking into a JOE or a MANDY every couple of years (or Richard Stanley's upcoming and much-anticipated THE COLOR OUT OF SPACE). By now, we expect Cage to be in something like this, but why the overqualified supporting cast? Never mind being unworthy of Laurence Fishburne. RUNNING WITH THE DEVIL isn't even worth Cole Hauser's time. (R, 100 mins)
CORPORATE ANIMALS (US - 2019)
It's hard to believe anyone thought a mash-up of OFFICE SPACE and ALIVE (or SURVIVE! if you're a more old-school exploitation fan) would be a good idea for anything other than an SNL skit that mercifully got cut for time. And rest assured, the barely-released satirical workplace cannibal comedy CORPORATE ANIMALS is every bit as abysmal as it sounds. There's a few admittedly witty one-liners that land ("You fucked my lunch?!"), but CORPORATE ANIMALS, directed by Patrick Brice and written by Sam Bain, both part of the Duplass Brothers inner circle, offers little beyond the obvious metaphorical implications of ambitious employees going to extreme measures to survive, whether it's in the office or being trapped in a cave-in while on an ill-advised spelunking excursion as a team building exercise. The trip was organized by Incredible Edible Cutlery's scheming, bitch-on-wheels CEO Lucy Vanderton (Demi Moore), but an impromptu change in plans where she badgers guide Brandon (co-producer Ed Helms, showing up long enough to remind you of THE OFFICE) into taking her staff on the "experienced" route, which soon proves disastrous when an earthquake causes a cave-in that crushes Brandon to death (exit Ed Helms at the 17-minute mark). With little water and nothing to eat other than a sample package of Incredible Edible Cutlery, tensions flare after a few days when the starving survivors--among them marketing head and Lucy's "Beyonce of Business" Jess (former DAILY SHOW correspondent Jessica Williams) and her chief rival and Lucy's former intern/boytoy Freddie the Fucktoy (DEADPOOL's Karan Soni)--decide to eat Brandon in order to survive (and discover that Lucy already helped herself to his arm while everyone else was asleep). Other than some scattered shots of flesh-munching, the film is skittish about venturing too far into the grossout realm, with most of the time spent with the characters arguing about office and personal grievances in almost total darkness, with the end result so tedious that it's hard to believe it's only been 80 minutes when the closing credits finally start rolling.
The cast is filled with funny and talented people--SNL vet Nasim Pedrad, Dan Bakkedahl cast radically against type as "Dan Bakkedahl," and the great Isiah Whitlock, Jr--but they aren't well utilized. Moore's inspired casting results in her getting some of the better lines ("Nut up and put that pussy into it!" she tells a terrified Pedrad as she descends into the cave, and later yelling "Your panic attack is not authorized!") and Freddie's weird obsession with Gary Sinise--even having a picture of him in his wallet--is a running gag that belongs in a better movie, but CORPORATE ANIMALS doesn't have anything beyond the cannibalism motif, and it doesn't even spend much time on it, instead exploring other avenues for "shock" comedy, like Harvey Weinstein jokes, full-frontal Bakkedahl, or Moore talking about rimjobs. You know your comedy is a lost cause when Isiah Whitlock Jr is in it and you don't even have him drop his signature line. Also with voice cameos by Britney Spears and members of the B-52s, for some reason. (R, 86 mins)
STRETCH (US - 2014) Written and directed by Joe Carnahan. Cast: Patrick Wilson, Ed Helms, James Badge Dale, Brooklyn Decker, Jessica Alba, Chris Pine, Ray Liotta, David Hasselhoff, Norman Reedus, Randy Couture, Shaun Toub, Ben Bray, Jason Mantzoukas, Kevin Bigley. (R, 94 mins)
VOD has proven to be a viable distribution channel in our post-SNOWPIERCER world, and Universal is hoping to replicate The Weinstein Company's unintended phenomenon with Joe Carnahan's STRETCH. Abruptly yanked from the schedule just a few weeks before its planned March 2014 release, STRETCH was one of several titles produced by Jason Blum's Blumhouse Productions (INSIDIOUS, SINISTER) that distributor Universal decided to leave languishing in limbo on the shelf, along with PARANORMAL ACTIVITY creator Oren Peli's AREA 51 (completed in 2009) and Joe Johnston's thriller NOT SAFE FOR WORK (completed in 2012), among others (STRETCH's time gathering dust was relatively brief, having wrapped in 2013). Universal hasn't said much about the shelving of these films, but it's mainly that the typical Blumhouse production costs $5 million or less, and that Universal balked at spending "$25 to $30 million" to market and distribute the films. It's now the major studio mindset that anything less than a $150 million take at the box office is a flop and movies grossing $30 million domestically simply aren't worth releasing in theaters anymore. There's no such thing as a moderate hit. Something's either a blockbuster or it's a bomb and in that climate, there's no in-between. Outspoken NARC and SMOKIN' ACES director Carnahan wasn't happy with Universal's decision, especially since he had a proven track record after he helmed a blockbuster with 2010's THE A-TEAM and had a decent-sized hit with the critically-acclaimed 2012 Liam Neeson vehicle THE GREY, which "only" grossed $51 million. When Universal shelved STRETCH earlier this year, they allowed Blum the chance to shop it around to other distributors, and when no one bit, the rights reverted back to Universal, and seeing the success of SNOWPIERCER, they opted to release it on VOD rather than dumping it straight-to-DVD. In interviews leading up to STRETCH's VOD debut, Carnahan has more or less taken an "It is what it is" approach to the release, expressing his disappointment that Universal abandoned what he considers his best film thus far. Carnahan is so sure that moviegoers will dig STRETCH that he posted messages on Facebook and Twitter promising that if you didn't enjoy STRETCH and can send him a pic proving you paid to watch it, he'll personally refund your money.
Like the word-of-mouth buzz with SNOWPIERCER and it being The Little Movie That Could, all of Carnahan's incessant yapping only serves to publicize STRETCH, though you have to applaud him for standing by his work and his in-your-face enthusiasm in making sure people know about it. It's too bad STRETCH isn't going to be another SNOWPIERCER, nor is it Carnahan's best film (that would be NARC). But then, the filmmaker has always straddled the line between maverick and loudmouth, better known for the films he didn't make--walking off of MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE III during pre-production, the collapsed DEATH WISH remake with Liam Neeson, and his dream project, an adaptation of James Ellroy's 1992 noir novel White Jazz--than the ones he's made. Carnahan's an enthusiastic filmmaker with a terrific sense of humor in his writing, and one of the few people making generally smart, no-nonsense, manly movies for men in the old-school tradition of Walter Hill. Sometimes he just talks too much.
STRETCH is entertaining if a bit slight, definitely in the over-the-top style of SMOKIN' ACES, but set in a typically excessive vision of L.A. Failed actor Kevin Bryzkowski (Patrick Wilson), who unsuccessfully tried to market himself as "Kai Bruno" before giving up after losing a guest role on CSI: MIAMI and taking a job as a limo driver, has kicked his coke, booze, and gambling habit and gotten over his ex-girlfriend (Brooklyn Decker) dumping him for the quarterback for the Cleveland Browns. He's been paying off a $12K debt to his bookie Iggy (Ben Bray), who's been bought out by some Cantonese gangsters who want the remaining $6000 he owes by midnight. Kevin, or "Stretch" as he's known to his friends, is on thin ice with his boss (Shaun Toub), who's paid guys to hack into the computer system of rival limo company Cossack, run by a hair-metal-coiffed hulk known as "The Jovi" (Randy Couture) so they can steal their gigs. Stretch gets one-upped by the Jovi when he's late picking up David Hasselhoff ("You don't have any respect for the Hoff!" he scolds Stretch), so he gets revenge by jacking the Jovi's next client, Carnahan regular Ray Liotta, from a movie set. Liotta leaves a prop gun and a fake badge from the movie behind, and Stretch doesn't get it back to the set before stealing the Jovi's next pickup: insane, cokehead billionaire Roger Karos (an unrecognizable Chris Pine). Karos has Stretch drop him off at an EYES WIDE SHUT-type sex party while he sends him off on a series of dangerous errands throughout L.A., involving a money pickup, a drug deal, and an undercover FBI agent (James Badge Dale), in exchange for a $6000 tip to clear his debt, and all the while Stretch is pursued by Iggy's goons, forced to pose as hard-assed LAPD cop "Raymond Liotta," and is harangued by the taunting ghost of his mentor, legendary limo driver Karl With a K (Ed Helms), who got so fed up with the business that he blew his brains out in mid-job, "marking the first time in 20 years that someone else had to clean his limo."
Carnahan packs a lot of plot into STRETCH's 94 minutes, and most of it works. Wilson has rarely been this loose onscreen before, but that's nothing compared to the way Pine (uncredited, but arguably the second lead) dives headfirst into his role with no concern for his image or any modicum of good taste. It's a literally balls-out performance, as he's first seen skydiving in nothing but a vest and a jockstrap, landing on top of Stretch's limo as Carnahan introduces him via a taint shot as his exposed scrotum slides down the front windshield. Yeah, STRETCH is that kind of a movie. Pine's overtly demonic Karos (often shot in reddish Italian horror lighting) seduces the desperate Stretch with the promise of $6000, with the resulting AFTER HOURS-inspired parade of grotesqueries an obvious metaphor for the way the power players of L.A. use, abuse, chew up, and spit out generally decent people like Stretch (or, if you expand on it, Hollywood dicking over well-meaning filmmakers like, oh I dunno, Joe Carnahan). Elsewhere, Karos snorts mountains of blow and cavorts with an array of high-class prostitutes, to whom he's also known as "Captain Fisty." Liotta, who also had a memorable cameo as himself in WANDERLUST, is very funny as an alternate universe, asshole version of "Ray Liotta," getting an assistant's name wrong and flat-out admitting "I don't give a fuck" when he's corrected, and being furiously indignant over the Jovi picking up "a TV actor" instead of him, even though he has no idea who Hasselhoff is ("Don't know him...should I?") or what KNIGHT RIDER and BAYWATCH are ("A talking car? What the fuck?"). Norman Reedus also has an inspired bit as himself, in a flashback where Karl With a K helps him cover up a motel room bloodbath ("Is that a severed penis?" Karl With a K asks). As funny as it can be, we've seen this sort-of "L.A. as immoral, hedonistic hellscape" motif a thousand times before, and despite some enthusiastic work by Wilson and Pine, some genuinely funny bits of offensive humor, and some periodic respites from the obnoxiousness courtesy of Jessica Alba as a limo dispatcher and Stretch's dependable Girl Friday, it frequently comes off as a Carnahan tantrum, and a louder, more aggressively garish version of John Landis' underrated 1985 gem INTO THE NIGHT. The actors are obviously having a good time, and it's worth a look on a slow night once it hits Redbox or Netflix Instant. Enough of it works that only a shameless asshole would ask Carnahan for their money back, but let's cut through the shit here: it's an offbeat little film that will find a minor cult following and probably enjoy a long future as the kind of movie you stop at while channel-surfing, but it wasn't going to be a hit in theaters.
UPDATE (10/21/2014)
As of 10/21/2014, STRETCH and three other shelved Blumhouse productions--NOT SAFE FOR WORK, the Stephen King adaptation MERCY, and the horror film MOCKINGBIRD (directed by THE STRANGERS' Bryan Bertino)--were released on DVD by Universal as Walmart exclusives.
