One of online film discourses’ favourite things to trot out every time he makes a new film is that David O Russell is a terrible person. That said his variety of star power-driven mid-level Oscar bait has always proved successful enough for a variety of studios to finance it. As this writer has said in his reviews previously Hollywood is not as moralistic as hayper left-leaning #filmtwitter thinks it is. From a personal perspective, this writer is a fan of Silver Linings Playbook but the rest of O Russell’s filmography comes across as largely forgettable. Thankfully depending on who you ask O Russell’s latest effort Amsterdam appears to be the moment where his bubble has burst. A tooth-gratingly unfunny crime comedy/ satire in which Margot Robbie, Christian Bale and John David Washington are framed for a crime they didn’t commit whilst also inadvertently getting themselves involved in the rise of fashion within 1930s Amsterdam. An $80 million movie when 80% of the budget appears to have gone to the cast salaries this is very much O Russell’s usual shtick. Except well previous efforts of his could get by on the charisma and the ridiculously overqualified cast alone. Amsterdam is a film where it feels like the hubris of the many stakeholders involved in getting this thing out the door is the only reason it exists. Is Disney/Fox the only reason why this thing exists? It’s not just the three leads. As is usual for O Russell a who’s who within the modern A/B list turns up for varying levels of the role some lasting mere minutes. They are working from a script where every line lands with a painful thud lacking any sort of comedic or satirical direction and the sense that this cast has been assembled from a phone book of Hollywood contacts that are here under potential duress. It’s just a parade of famous people assuming that production has the potential to be good thanks to their mere presence. Why is the rating this reviewer is about to assign not even lower one may ask? Well because one of the most famous women alive turns up for screen time that is surprisingly plot-critical. and is dealt one of the most cartoonish deaths for any media character released in 2022. It’s straight out of Looney Tunes. The fact is a celebrity of her stature would agree to something this cartoonish is just inherently hilarious in both the right and wrong ways. Especially given that this person has just dropped an album with a sentiment on the hook of the lead single designed to be sloganeering and eaten up by fans across every conceivable piece of merch you can think of. One of the most baffling yet memorable film moments of 2022.
Amsterdam is objectively terrible. Regardless of David O Russell being an easy target, his brand of star-driven fare has decidedly run out of steam. The huge cast seems to be doing it out of obligation. The full package represents one of the most deserved flops in recent filmmaking. Plenty will delight in O Russell’s misery but regardless of that his filmmaking
3/10.
Amsterdam. Quick Review.
A Little Bit Of Everything 