Roman J. Israel, Esq.

Denzel Washington tries to carry this movie on his back. He is in every scene. The movie is way to long and way too dialogue driven. It's another example of written and directed by going wrong. There are too many walk and talks. Sit and talks. Characters make long speeches and usually say nothing. After about an hour and a half there's an incident that creates a bit of suspense and finally makes things interesting. Problem it is too little too late. Maybe Denzel gets a Golden Globe nomination more for a body of work rather then this performance of mostly adjusting his glasses. That bit of business becomes distracting and almost laughable. There is no need to see this on the big screen. It will play just as talky in the comfort of your own home. Perhaps at home you can fast forward and move things along.

Denzel Washington can carry a movie and that is the only reason that seeing this movie isn't a complete disappointment. As a Canadian I wondered if the movie never seemed to get out of the gate because I missed Los Angeles cultural nuances that for the conversant made it filled with purpose. I found that the characters had a lot about themselves and their lives that could have been developed, but only the surface was skimmed. Background was in staccato snippets that left a lot on the table in terms of building depth, drawing me in, or giving me a good reason to keep watching. Not all occurrences in the movie were plausible, which is problematic as the movie aims to be realistic. The character of George was unexpectedly interesting, so that added a star to my bottom line.

I have given this movie a 3 just because Denzel was in it. He did a great job in portraying this Autistic person, but the movie just really stunk. I wanted to and tried to like it, but to say that I did would be a lie. The first half of the movie was interesting and looked like it was building a good story line. Somewhere towards the end, the entire movie just went completely sideways. It started jumping all over the place and was hard to follow. There were scenes with people crying and you didn't know what they were crying about. There was a scene in which Roman and the civil rights lady found what they thought was a dead African American man on the corner. Two police officers pulled up and began to act like complete fools, which gave Roman the opportunity to announce to the world his thoughts on American politics. then the dead guy gets up and walks away. The Police officers drive off and there's just Roman and the lady. What the hell was that?. Don't wasted and money on this mess and there will be no Oscar's for this mess.