I didn’t go in expecting much from Deadfall to be honest, I have yet to see a good film with Olivia Wilde in and I find Eric Bana a very dull actor. Pair that with the star of Pacific Rim, a film I hated, and you kind of have a recipe for disaster. I do so love when I’m right.
Deadfall centres on a Southern brother/sister pair with some incestuous implications, who have just committed a heist in Las Vegas and find themselves stranded in a snowstorm on route to Canada. They split up with Addison (Eric Bana) committing various murders while his sister Liza (Olivia Wilde) runs into the recently released convict Jay (Charlie Hunnam), who offers her a ride via his parents’ house for Thanksgiving dinner.
Addison’s route involves him battling with a few cops, before showing his softer side by saving a family from an abusive father, it offers some light action but is mostly a tedious journey leading him to converge on Jay’s house. You also get the most bizarre scene I’ve seen in years, when a Native American jumps out at him from behind the trees says he saw him in a vision and then cuts off one of his fingers, it will seriously make your head hurt. Liza and Jay go through a dull, hacky love story that teaches us that sex always leads to love.
The acting is atrocious across the board, with no actor being saved from the awful, tired dialogue. There is nothing on show that is original, with much of the story being a clichéd mess. Among the characters mentioned we get a sexist police chief played by Treat Williams and his cop daughter who receives a tirade of abuse from her father or any other cop whenever she attempts to so much as breathe, you really have to wonder how she even joined the force. They share one exchange in which her father suggests she shouldn’t go out on the manhunt for Addison because she may need to change her tampon, which is the worst scene of the entire film.
There’s also Jay’s parents, the surly Chet (Kris Kristofferson) and traditional housewife June (Sissy Spacek) who exist just to be hostages in the inevitable showdown. Considering that the whole film is clearly leading to the Thanksgiving dinner confrontation, which even the female cop is invited to for no real reason, there isn’t much tension created. This may just be because the characters are either unlikeable or dull, making it hard to care for the fates of any of them. After the showdown the film basically just ends full stop, providing no closure to certain subplots, such as the (quite minor) storyline with the female police officer who has an option to leave for the FBI.
The extras are thin and uninteresting much like the plot, consisting of a couple of making of featurettes, interviews with Eric Bana, Olivia Wilde and the director. Only one of the extras lasts over three minutes and give no real information.
Overall Verdict: This film is so boring and clichéd that you’ll probably want to tear your eyes out in the first ten minutes. It somehow feels overlong despite only running for an hour and half and frankly I’d advise you to avoid it at all costs.
Special Features:
Snow and Western
The Family
Eric Bana Interview
Olivia Wilde Interview
Stefan Ruzowitzky Interview
Reviewer: Matt Mallinson