Focus
Don't Go! Sexy but unsatisfying.
Connin' 'n' lovin' is troublin'.
Whatta man, whatta man, whatta man, whatta mighty good man (say it again y'all). Willard Carroll Smith Jr., known to us plebs as Will Smith; the man with the ordinary name but abnormally high levels of charm and charisma. He's still electrifying cinema screens at the ripe age of 46. The laugh, the smile, the stature - all quintessentially Willsmithian - everything gravitates towards him. There are film stars, and then there is Will Smith.
Which doesn't necessarily mean that all Will Smith films are decent. Wild Wild West (1999) proved that there are some scripts that even a $6.6 billion dollar smile can't save. Focus, however, with Smith playing a veteran con man alongside a novice con lady, Margot Robbie (Wolf of Wall Street) seems like it should be a an easy steal...
Which doesn't necessarily mean that all Will Smith films are decent. Wild Wild West (1999) proved that there are some scripts that even a $6.6 billion dollar smile can't save. Focus, however, with Smith playing a veteran con man alongside a novice con lady, Margot Robbie (Wolf of Wall Street) seems like it should be a an easy steal...
Honourable thief Nicky Spurgeon (Smith) runs a team of jolly and quick-handed thieves during the New Orleans Superbowl and takes thieving enthusiast and coincidental super-hottie Jess Barrett (Robbie) under his wing. As ever, when you put two sexy crooks together all that crime gets very titillating. Before you know it, they're grifting the pants off each other. In spite of getting a good grifting, the weepy-eyed question is ever-present, can you ever trust a con artist? Are you just playing me? Are we going to work together to make that one big score to take us out of the game forever so we can both live happily ever after? Are your eyes even weeping or have you just been chopping onions!?!? You BASTARD! But I love you so much! But do I?! Oooh (etc. etc.).
Focus hits all of those marks and makes a noble attempt to enrich the film by making more of the central characters' relationship than usual. It is shot with the slickness and glamour befitting of a crime that, for some reason, we tend to think of as being cool rather than, well, criminal. The cars are fast, the sun is shining and the clothes are nicely cut - everything looks like a Vogue pickpocket special. That said, this is the kind of magazine you would read for the pictures; not the articles. For crooks to get away with it, we have to be convinced that they are driven by love or some equally majestic concept, like revenge. Focus isn't far off from succeeding in this, but the characters lack the depth and motivation that is so important for us to fall in love with them; as well as for us to believe that they have actually fallen in love with each other.
Focus hits all of those marks and makes a noble attempt to enrich the film by making more of the central characters' relationship than usual. It is shot with the slickness and glamour befitting of a crime that, for some reason, we tend to think of as being cool rather than, well, criminal. The cars are fast, the sun is shining and the clothes are nicely cut - everything looks like a Vogue pickpocket special. That said, this is the kind of magazine you would read for the pictures; not the articles. For crooks to get away with it, we have to be convinced that they are driven by love or some equally majestic concept, like revenge. Focus isn't far off from succeeding in this, but the characters lack the depth and motivation that is so important for us to fall in love with them; as well as for us to believe that they have actually fallen in love with each other.
Sadly, the relationship between Smith and Robbie is distinctly lacking in the realism, tension and direction that the film craves. Without that emotional connection, the characters become selfish chancers who probably take diamonds from old ladies when the cameras aren't rolling. Everything feels rather played out and stilted. Add to this a bad guy who isn't really very bad at all (played by Rodrigo Santoro, 300) and there is even less energy driving this film. It's all a bit of a shrug.
So don't go - it is kind of fun, kind of cool, and kind of twisty, but you'll leave with little satisfaction. Like the cons played out in the film, Focus looks all good on the outside, but underneath, it feels distinctly empty.
So don't go - it is kind of fun, kind of cool, and kind of twisty, but you'll leave with little satisfaction. Like the cons played out in the film, Focus looks all good on the outside, but underneath, it feels distinctly empty.
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