Courtesy Amazon MGM Studios
Somehow there’s this silly little cinema micro-genre that might best be described as “piece of shit brothers do crimes.” (See 2017’s Logan Lucky with Adam Driver and Channing Tatum or even 1995’s Money Train with Woody Harrelson and Wesley Snipes). These can be fun and all, but Brothers from Amazon’s Prime Originals feels more like a contractual obligation for its actors than it does a comedy anyone actually wanted to make. Perhaps that’s why its theatrical and streaming premieres practically overlapped. Or maybe Brolin’s Thanos juice has evaporated? Either way, Brothers is just plain a pretty bad movie.
Brolin and Dinklage are Moke and Jady Munger, twins and lifelong larcenists who know a thing or two about blah blah blah. The meat of Brothers mostly occurs following Jady’s release from prison. Moke fell in love and went straight during his brother’s stint in jail, but Jady’s got one last big jobber in mind. With a corrupt prison guard (an over-the-top and underused Brendan Fraser) on their tails and Moke and Jady’s crime-breakin’ mama (Glenn Close, weirdly) pulling their strings, the titular brothers set out for their final big score.
Brothers comes to us from Palm Springs director Max Barbakow and Idiocracy/Tropic Thunder screenwriter Etan Cohen, who is absolutely not to be confused with Ethan Coen, who makes good movies—though it does seem like Etan is trying to do his own little Coen Brothers dark comedy sort of thing.
Unlike Cohen’s previous efforts, which have been at least a little funny, this one is a fairly boring affair throughout. Brolin and Dinklage have zero chemistry as a pair, brotherly or otherwise, and despite an unexpectedly stacked cast including the aforementioned Close and Fraser, plus M. Emmet Walsh (RIP) and the ever-excellent Marisa Tomei, audiences will find little with which to connect.
Yes, yes—there’s a scene where a man throws an escaped orangutan a handie, and it’s certainly fun to see Close attempt a borderline slapstick comedic performance. But when a film’s main players struggle to find even mildly funny moments amongst a mountain of non-engaging dialogue and the jokes all come from the “that’s gonna leave a mark!” vein…look, Brothers is a slog. In fact, everyone who acted in this thing deserves better, which almost makes it feel like a Producers-ish deliberate-failure-for-complicated-tax-reasons sort of thing, without the unexpected popularity part.
Thank goodness Brothers is watchable at home, because it sure would have been a drag to have watched it in a real theater. Break the glass only in case of a severe boredom emergency. Otherwise, watch anything else.
3
+Glenn Close and Brendan Fraser are still Glenn Close and Brendan Fraser
-Brolin and Dinklage stink; funny, but definitely not ha-ha-funny
Brothers
Directed by Barbakow
With Brolin, Dinklage, Close, Fraser, Walsh and Tomei
Amazon Prime, R, 89 min.
