Movie Reaction: Free Fire

Formula: Shoot 'Em Up * The Nice Guys

Movies don't have to be hard. At least, they don't have to look hard. Way too often, people look to whatever movie is doing the toughest things (complex effects, dramatic performances, intricate shots, convoluted plot) as the best. There's some truth to that. If you want to look at movie quality as an objective thing - and lord knows I have that tendency - those are some of the things that hold a lot of weight for good reason. However, movies can be simple too and still be great.

Free Fire is a very simple movie. It's the closest thing film has to a bottle episode. Here's the movie: In the late 1970s, a gun deal goes wrong and everyone gets stuck in a shootout. That's it. The movie spends a little bit of time introducing the players. Justine (Brie Larson) is the intermediary between some IRA members and some gun sellers. The IRA members, Chris (Cillian Murphy) and Frank (Michael Smiley) are very suspicious of everyone. The gun sellers are represented by hired gun, Ord (Armie Hammer), former black panther, Martin (Babou Ceesay), and insufferable South African, Vernon (Sharlto Copely) who rubs everyone the wrong way. Both sides have a couple grunts and it turns out that those grunts have personal issues with each other that escalate until shots are fired. Everyone takes sides and takes cover. Then it's a matter of seeing who gets out alive with either the money, the guns, or both. I'm a big fan of this structure because it's simple, character-driven story telling: setup characters, put them in a place, and see what happens.

There is a risk to doing this. When you take away the importance of plotting, everything else has to be on point. If you don't like the characters, gunfights, or the humor, then I can't do anything to convince you to like the movie. Luckily for me, the tone worked perfectly. Sharlto Coplely is lovably hateable. Everyone else has an "I'm getting too old for this shit" vibe or simply seem bothered by the inconvenience of the gunfight. I don't know if any character actually says, "Are we really doing this?" but they are all thinking it. I loved tracking who is shifting allegiances and the sub-feuds going on. I loved keeping track of the geography of the room and who was still in play. Between The Nice Guys and now this*, I've accepted that I'm a fan of the late 70's as a setting. All of it worked for me and in a tight 90 minute package.

*Not to mention 20th Century Women, The Get Down on Netflix, and Inherent Vice not that long ago.

That's not to say it's perfect. More than once it felt like they should've been able to get out of the gunfight rather than escalate matters. Just about everyone gets shot in the leg eventually, so everyone spends 90% of their time crawling around on their stomachs. It got a little hard to remember where everyone was in relation to everyone else at times. While I found Copely's character endearing, others may find him only annoying. The characters could definitely be better drawn (although it isn't needed). None of this bothered me enough to spoil my enjoyment. I could see others having a harder time with it.

Judging by the paltry opening weekend box office numbers (a sub-$1000 per theater average on over 1000 screens) not everyone was as drawn to this movie as I was. It's for a niche audience, but if you are the type of person who gets any thrill at all out of Smokin' Aces, Shoot 'em Up, or Guy Richie's earlier movies, then you'll find a lot to enjoy here.

Verdict (?): Strongly Recommend