Suburbicon (dir. George Clooney)

A-List actor George Clooney returns to the directors seat once again, after suffering from a barrage of negativity over his last film “The Monuments Men”, with an attempt at satirising the prejudices of post-war America. Partly based on a script written by the Coen brothers back in 1986, Clooney and his trusted writing partner Grant Heslov present a troubled tale of an insurance scam in a predominantly white community in 1950’s New York.

Where Clooney’s previous directorial efforts have had troubles have been in their misrepresentation of tone; the aforementioned “Monuments Men” is a classic example of uninspired storytelling coupled with charmless wit. When compared with earlier efforts like Confessions of a Dangerous Mind and the truly excellent and shamefully underrated Good Night & Good Luck, he presented delicate portrayals of troubled men with an unfussy direction. Unfortunately in the case of this black-comedy Surbibicon, which sees him collaborate with the excellent acting talents of stars like Matt Damon, Julianne Moore and Oscar Isaac, his latest effort is more of a muddled Fargo-esque caper which fails miserably at it’s social satire and crime caper antics with equal measure.

It’s 1950’s upstate New york, and the predominantly white community of “Surbibicon”, tensions are running high in the streets when an African American family relocate to the neighbourhood. Seen as a social faux-paux, the town quickly rallies to their local representatives to ostracize them from the town amid fears of racial integration.

Soon after, during a haphazard plot development, local resident Gardner Lodge (Matt Damon) wakes his young son Nicky ( Noah Jupe) up with a terrifying realisation. “There are men in the house, you have to get up”. Next thing you know, the two hitman have killed the wheelchair-bound matriarch of the house Rose Lodge (Julianne Moore, who also plays her twin sister Margaret), and left without a trace. In addition to this madness, an angry white-mob have descended on the newly arrived African-American family (The Myers), though this hastily incorporated sub-plot does little to peak your interest and serves nothing more than an failed attempt at contextualising a time period notable for racial discrimination.

When the police commissioner, and more notably the silver tongued insurance investigator Bud Coupe (Oscar Isaac), arrive to pick holes in the Lodge househould assault, it appears that things aren’t what they seem surrounding the murder. The plot than follows similar Coen outfits like Fargo, though with less than half of the originality and assured direction. Our intersecting storylines progress with little respect for human life or indeed narrative cohesion, and you spend the rest of the film admiring the cinematography and attention to details of the 1950s landscape, but finding the plot and mishandled tone of the piece distracting.

It’s not a boring film by any means, a particular scene with Oscar Isaac and Julianne More (no doubt form the Coen brothers original script) is a fantastic example of Isaac’s charisma which has grown exponentially in recent years, and as the drama continues there’s a certain enjoyment in watching the calamities of the characters. The main issue with the film is it attempts at combing three separate narratives, all of which aren’t written or directed particularly well, and expecting you to care about the poorly drawn characters.

There is a potentially solid and well drawn B-movie film within the script, though it appears this was butchered at a later date, most importantly removing the comedy element which is noticeable only by its absence, and by Clooney and Heslov who have attempted to contextualize the themes and motifs to an extent that doesn’t service the tone of the film in any measure. Maybe Clooney would have been better served in front of the camera rather than behind it.

Rating; 2/5.