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SimplyScripts Screenwriting Discussion Board    Reviews    Movie, Television and DVD Reviews  ›  What Doesn't Kill You Moderators: Nixon
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Murphy
Posted: March 20th, 2009, 5:24pm Report to Moderator
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From first time director Brian Goodman 'What Doesn't Kill You' is a character piece based on a true story about two best friends, Paulie and Brian (Ethan Hawke and Mark Ruffalo) from South Boston who grow up with the wrong crowd. Very much in the vein of Gone Baby Gone and Mystic River, it is a gritty drama that gives its leading actors a chance to shine.

If anybody has seen Goodfella's or The Sopranos then they would find it easy to quickly identify and be comfortable with the world Paulie and Brian are part of (only this time, being Boston and not Jersey, it is the Irish and not the Italians). The film already assumes that its viewers have this information as it wastes very little time in explaining what is going on. It begins with the end, a device I often like it a film, it is sometimes fun watching a movie knowing the end and wondering how the hell they got there. It opens with a scene of what seems to be a botched up armored car heist and a shoot out with the police, we get a few minutes of flashbacks of the two boys growing up before we are quickly brought up to speed with very little exposition. To be honest I though the screenwriters did a great job here, after ten minutes I felt I knew everything I needed to about these characters. I was very impressed to be honest. Very quick, short scenes, that whole business about getting in late and leaving early, the first act of this film is a great example of that.

Unfortunately however I think overall the script was flawed. There was no plot at all and I find watching any movie without a plot to be a ball ache. Just because something is character driven and high on emotion is does not mean to say that we can do without a plot, The film just went on from one scene to another, watching these men's lives, but with nothing propelling the story forward at all. Which is weird because we started with the armored car heist and yet this is not a story about an armored car heist. I can only assume that they decided to go with the final scene upfront trick when they realised they needed to have something to keep the viewer engaged for a 100 minutes.

What does make this movie however is the acting performances, especially Mark Ruffalo, he was perfectly cast and is outstanding in this. I have only seen him in a few things up to now, I thought he was great in last years 'Blindness', but based in this performance I think he is certainly going to go on to bigger and better things. Ethan Hawke seems to be back on track too, I was wondering last night if I had actually seen him in anything since 'Training Day' but of course he was in the similar, but much better 'Before the Devil Knows Your Dead', a film I thought was great.

For some reason, while the guys were allowed to use American Boston accents, the girls seemed to have some very strange Irish accents, really off-putting, I would love to know if that is what girls from Boston really sound like? very off, not sure Amanda Peet pulled it off at all. But apart from that she was very good as Brian's wife.

Anyway, considering this was a film directed by someone who's previous career highlight was a bit part in three episodes of 'Lost' and a writing team that included that well known and respected screen-writer 'Donnie Whalberg' this actually was a fairly decent movie. Like I said the first act was great writing and worth it for that alone, I actually did learn a thing or two from watching this.

7/10
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Toby_E
Posted: March 21st, 2009, 6:00am Report to Moderator
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I've been trying to track down the script of this for a little while... Haven't yet seen the film, but I was interested with it. Some of my favourite crime films are set in Boston (Departed, Gone Baby Gone, Mystic River etc.), and seeing as this was written by a South Boston native (Donnie Wahlberg), who grew up around crime, I'm guessing it should be a pretty realistic, and reliable account.

And for a 'true' South Boston female accent, listen to Amy Ryan's character in Gone Baby Gone. My friend in Boston said it was exactly how that type of women talks.


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