‘Southern Fury’ will probably be a film you will see streaming on Netflix or the like very soon. Throughout viewing it I had a feeling that this will be just another film that gets swept under the rug from the get go. I have seen this kind of film before. They’re known as rainy-day thrillers, something you put on when it’s raining outside, you have a day off and just need something to do for an hour or so. But that doesn’t mean rainy-day thrillers can’t be good, the latest instalments in Jaume Collet-Serra’s filmography prove that. So the question remains that whether or not ‘Southern Fury’ will work as a rainy-day thriller.
The story is one that isn’t unfamiliar. JP (and yes that is his name) and Mikey are brothers who were once as close to each other as fish and chips, despite the worst of situations. All grown up the younger JP has become a successful construction manager while Mikey has fallen hard into drug- and arms dealing. The brothers, despite their efforts have never been further apart. That is until Mikey goes missing with a ‘mysterious’ caller telling JP to deliver an obscene amount of money in a set time. Everyone but JP think that Mikey is in on it so JP finds himself the only man who can save his brother. But all throughout, things…well things happen.
Southern Fury
It turns out that the question of ‘Southern Fury’ working as a rainy-day thriller is a very easy one to answer, because no it doesn’t. With films like this you know very well that you are not going to receive art of the highest calibre, although ‘Southern Fury’ does try so and to say it tries in vein is an understatement. Sticking with the story, it’s just too basic and formulaic. Beat for beat you can tell what’s going to happen. You know who the villain is from minute one, not helped by the fact that he is played by Nicolas Cage. It also has a horrible habit of throwing in new subplots and character moments that come from nowhere and return to where they come without achieving anything. An example is when Cage meets his brother; I thought this was going to lead to some strange conspiracy plot that could have taken me off guard, but instead it goes nowhere and is ended in the next scene. Being formulaic is a struggle enough without it being unfocused on top of it all.
As for the characters, what about them? You could rename everyone to Mr or Mrs Bland for the impression they leave. JP’s defining features are his constant monologues about how his brother is not a bad guy, just misunderstood, and the name that I’m certain is the abbreviation of ‘Jurassic Park’. Mikey has even less character to him. He is the big brother, the obvious victim and that is all. In truth he’s such a big man that I’m surprised that he was caught in the first place. All other characters I won’t really go into, because I’ve already forgotten them. There were only two more who stood out. There was a cop character who tries to help JP, who’s defining feature is that he is played by the once acclaimed and much sort-after John Cusack. A man who is clearly just hear to grab a pay-slip. And then the villain, who again is only really defined by the actor playing him. Nicolas Cage is also hear for the pay-slip but he at least looks to be having some fun in the role. He has his now infamous freak-out moments in the film, has a bizarre costume too; the shirt and all that are fine, the hair is a little weird, but it was the prosthetic nose that caught me off guard. Every time I saw his nose it was a huge distraction for me. I know it’s a strange thing to keep bringing up but to see Nicolas Cage with the nose of Gerard Depardieu is a major distraction to his scenes.
Southern Fury
Other than that the directing is basic. Not bad, at least until the end, but basic. There are tricks that director Steven C. Miller has seen done well in other films, like the tracking shot from ‘Good Fellas’, the torture scene from ‘Reservoir Dogs’ and the slow-motion blood-splatter action from ‘Dredd’, but he has no idea how to implement them. In ‘Good Fellas’ we found it visually interesting and striking, while also giving us an insight into the protagonists mind. ‘Reservoir Dogs’ made us care for the character while also making us fear Michael Madson. ‘Dredd’ used the idea of drugs and the cartoonish style of Verhoeven action films to set the tone for the world around the characters. This film does none of that. That makes the tracking shots and torture scenes boring and the slow-motion laughable. Although to be fair you could have had the skills of Ridley Scott and you still wouldn’t have been able to survive the script. No line of dialogue is memorable, the pacing and tone are completely off, one moment being overly serious and the next a cartoon, and as stated before is completely muddled and unfocused.
But the films biggest sin is how boring it is. It never keeps your focus for more than a few minutes before you get distracted by that mark on your wall. The only scenes that kept me interested were when it became laughably bad. Nicolas Cage can usually be counted on for a laugh in a supposedly serious moment, of course. The slow-motion violence was so poorly implemented that it was a joy to see what faces our actors were making at the time. And there was also one of the most unnecessary, pointless and completely unsexy sex scenes I’ve seen since watching the trailer to ’Fifty Shades Darker’, which just had me laughing at how it was done and handled, not to mention the fact that it was here at all.
The sad truth is that the only time I would say this film should be put on is when you need white-noise while doing the ironing. It’s sadly not good enough to work as a rainy-day thriller and it’s not bad enough to be entertaining. What we have is just a forgettable action thriller with average directing, okay acting and some laughable moments that are sadly far too few. It’s really hard to get angry or offended by film that will leave not a single impression on you. Now might be a good time to change the title from ‘Southern Fury’ to ‘Southern Placid’.
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