Purely Joyful Movie!

Good start, but then it gets ruined

I like movies that are aware of what they are selling... without [any] greater aspirations than to make people laugh and that's it.

There's a good chance the film will make you laugh out loud, but if it doesn't, there's an even better chance it will make you openly sob.

Cold in July is flawed southern noir seedy thriller set in the late 1980s. Dane (Michael C Hall) shoots an intruder in his home. He becomes a local hero but the dead man's father Russel (Sam Shepard) comes looking for him and threatens Dane's family. The police take Russel away but Dane discovers that dirty cops want to kill Russel. Now Russel and Dane team up and find out that the dead intruder was not Russel's son.To get answers, Russel brings in an old friend, a private detective Jim Bob (Don Johnson) who thinks Russel's son was involved in the Dixie mafia and now might be in witness protection. All three enter the dark world of snuff videos and vengeance.The film is full of plot holes, I never figured why the police wanted Russel dead and created such an elaborate scheme or why they were protecting his no good son. What begins as a cat and mouse game between Dane and Russel becomes a buddy thriller with Jim Bob providing comic relief.

I'm not too sure what I expected when I started to watch this film, but within the first minute, I was hooked. A couple are awoken by the noise of an intruder downstairs and the terrified husband bravely decides to go and see what's going on. He takes his father's gun with him which he has taken out of an old shoe-box. He creeps downstairs, his gun shaking in his hand, pulls the trigger by accident and the intruder is shot dead.My wife, who is Thai, asked me why the man wasn't arrested, but I explained to her that this was America and everyone had a gun and they were within their rights to shoot an intruder in their home. She asked if he would have to pay any money to the dead man's relatives. "No darling, they don't pay 'blood money' in America."In the aftermath of the shooting, the shooter, Dane, is feted as a hero and the case is closed within 24 hours. The stupid mutt who broke in is buried with little ceremony at a cemetery on the edge of town. We learn that he was a wanted felon, so he got what he deserved.Enter stage right the dead man's father - also a felon - just released on bail who proceeds to make veiled threats against Dane's young son. The police initially dismiss the threats as being without substance, but after the old man breaks into Dane's house and leaves messages in the form of bullets in the young boy's bed, the cops get serious. So far so good and the acting and the action will hold you to your seats.In spite of police hiding in the woods and an ex-commando cop sitting inside the house, the old man, Ben, succeeds in outwitting them all, visits the son in his bedroom before making his escape. Good suspenseful stuff. I am still hooked.A day later the sheriff calls Dane to advise that Ben was captured in Mexico and is on his way back to Texas for a long spell in jail. Case closed, everybody celebrates and we all breathe a sigh of relief. Just when you begin to wonder where the story can go from here; Daney boy is leaving the police station after signing a few forms, when he sees a wanted poster for the man he killed, still pinned to the police notice board. He takes it down and looks at the mug shot. The man he killed looks nothing like the mug shot on the photo. He tries to tell the sheriff but the cop doesn't want to know - Dane is mistaken, he insists and refuses to discuss it.Very intriguing, and you start to wonder where the story will go from here. You grab a quick cup of tea and return to your comfy seat, fully expecting the second half of the film to be as good as the first half.When I tell you that I almost turned the movie off near the end, you can get an idea of how dire it was. Never have I seen a film that starts off in Oscar-worthy mode and descends into razzle mode so quickly.Dane stakes out the cop shop and sees the sheriff and his cop cohorts smuggle Ben into a car late at night and leave him drugged and tied up, lying across a rail line out of town. Although the plot is already starting to signs of cracking, I still stay with it. Daney boy can't make up his mind whether to rescue Ben or not. Hurry up! The train is coming… and just when you think it is too late, he snatches Ben away from a ghastly death. Corny but still just about worth watching to see what happens.But it goes downhill very quickly from here. The long corny second half tale is so full of plot holes it would take an army of writers to fix them. Shy, nerdy Dane teams up with Ben.Together with a wild west mate who Ben calls in to help, they go in search of Ben's son, after digging up the grave to convince Ben that it wasn't his son who was killed by Dan. They discover that the cops are protecting Ben Jr in a witness protection programme, but there is no credible explanation as to why the cops wanted Ben dead. The robbery was staged by the cops to convince the local bad boys that Ben Jr was dead. So there were already two potential deaths instigated by cops to protect one very evil dude.It gets worse. It turns out that witness-protected Ben Jr is busy making porn 'snuff' videos, with Jr personally killing the young Mexican girls they 'employ' for each movie. Let's tell the cops, says Dane. He is told the cops are fully aware of what Ben Jr is up to, and they don't care.So let's get this straight, they kill some innocent punter back in Dan's hometown by telling him to go robbing, they do their damnedest to kill Ben's father for reasons that are not clear, and they have no issues with any number of underage Mexican girls being brutally murdered on camera by this man they are protecting.There is much more in the way of coincidences and ridiculous plot lines, but I think you get the idea. As was to be expected, there is a mass shoot out at the end of the movie where timid Dane has been transformed into an avenging Rambo and the three of them go on a killing spree that would do justice to a Scorsese film.Dane returns home to small-town America and back to his job, making picture frames, but we know that life will never be the same. What a load of old….But what do I know?

Cold in July is directed by Jim Mickle and Mickle co-adapts the screenplay with Nick Damici from the novel written by Joe R. Lansdale. It stars Sam Shepard, Michael C. Hall and Don Johnson. Music is by Jeff Grace and cinematography is by Ryan Samul.1989 Texas and when Richard Dane (Hall) shoots and kills a burglar in his home, his life shifts into very dark places.A quality neo-noir pulper, Cold in July thrives because it never rests on its laurels. It consistently throws up narrative surprises, spinning the protagonists and us the audience into different territories. Fronted by three striking lead performances, each portraying a different type of character who bounce off of each other perfectly, the pic also has that late 80s swaggering appeal. Be it Grace's shifty synth based score, or the way Samul's photography uses primary colours for bold bluster, it's period reflective and tonally in keeping with the story.With substance in the writing, moody and dangerous atmosphere unbound and tech credits at the high end, this one is recommended with confidence to neo-noir fans. 8/10

Kewl film. Wasn't as graphic and brutal as I'd hoped, but then again, I've probably been looking at too many Korean, French and German thrillers lately.Almost everything was right with this movie - the acting, pacing, cinematography, direction, sound design, etc. Sam Shepard, looking as worn as merle Haggard, played his part well. Don Johnson also hit the nail on the head as well as Michael Hall.This was a tense enough thriller and didn't really drag. The unexpected twists sure kept me on my toes. My biggest issue, however, was the incompleteness of the script. What happened to all the corrupt cops? They disappear into thin air? Maybe there's a sequel to 'Cold In July' in the wings. Let's hope so.