Cobby, an alcoholic ex-convict, and Rory, a depressed ex-marine, are recruited by a crooked businessman to carry out a robbery. What is it about? Stealing the loot illegally amassed over the years by the indestructible mayor, who should soon be re-elected for the umpteenth time. Obviously, nothing goes as planned, the supposedly ingenious plan turns out to be deeply botched. Unfortunately, this observation also applies to the screenplay, the direction, and sometimes the interpretation, of the film The Instigators (The instigators), a police comedy that struggles to make people laugh and whose action is boring.
Veterans of the saga Ocean’s Eleven (The unknown of Las Vegas) and its sequels, other stories of comic robberies, Matt Damon and Casey Affleck are old friends in the city. Hence their obvious complicity on screen.
That’s about all that works in this film produced by the co-stars and Apple.
Camped in Boston, the stronghold of Damon and Affleck, The Instigators is based on a plot as uninspiring as the film’s gray bill. The shenanigans of the powerful, starting with those of the outgoing mayor (Ron Perlman, à la Donald Trump), are contrasted with the modest ones of ordinary people: that’s the social commentary. During their escape, Cobby (Affleck) and Rory (Damon) seek help from the latter’s psychologist (Hong Chau).
That being said, given how little Chau (Damon’s partner in Downsizing/Small format), most of the humor is supposed to come from the pseudo-Tarantinoesque verbal jousting between Cobby and Rory. The trouble is, the overabundant dialogue just isn’t funny.
The same goes for the sequences that should constitute the highlights of such a film, namely the robbery that goes wrong (in contrast to the smooth version shown at the start, at Gambit/An extraordinary hold-up), the inevitable car chase that follows and, finally, the all-out effort that allows the protagonists to pull it together in extremis, in the last act. All this should be breathtaking, but no: even the unexpected explosion of the bar where Rory and Cobby are hiding at one point doesn’t make anyone flinch.
At a lethargic pace, indifferent progress.
Not inspired
Coming from director Doug Liman, this is surprising. For the record, Liman directed Damon in The Bourne Identity (Memory in the skin), in addition to directing a plethora of other action films, sometimes serious in content (Edge of Tomorrow/A day without a tomorrow), sometimes comical (Mr. & Mrs. Smith/Mr. and Mrs.me Smith).
Recently, his deliberately outrageous remake of Road House (Roadside bar), starring Jake Gyllenhaal, was a hit on competitor Prime’s platform.
In short, Liman was, technically, in his element. It seems that the material really did not inspire him. We understand why.