Summary
5 tech score
Zoe Saldana and Christian Bale in “Out of the Furnace”; photo courtesy of Relativity
“Out of the Furnace” (Relativity)
“Out of the Furnace” is a movie with an amazing cast. This includes Christian Bale, Casey Affleck, Woody Harrelson, Sam Shepard, Willem Dafoe and Zoe Saldana. But having a good cast is never enough if the script isn’t good and in “Out of the Furnace” the script is lacking. There is a lot of action but little substance.
Bale plays Russell Baze, a man who is content for the most part with his life. He works in a refinery in the “rust belt” of the Northeast. He makes enough to survive and he has a girlfriend, Lena (Saldana), who makes his life special. His main problem is his younger brother Rodney (Affleck) who thinks the world owes him more than he is getting.
An accident which results in the death of someone sends Russell to prison for a while. During this time his father dies and his girlfriend takes up with another man. Rodney gets messed up in the dealings of small time crook John Petty (Dafoe). He convinces Petty to let him work a fight under the guidance of Harlan DeGroat (Harrelson). Rodney is supposed to throw the fight so DeGroat can make some money but things don’t work out the way they should.
When things go wrong Russell feels the obligation to make them right. This leads him into danger when DeGroat decides to make an example of him. It is man against man and one of them is a stone cold killer.
It would seem this story could work to make an interesting and enjoyable movie but somehow the pieces just never seem to fit. Violence piles on top of violence but a clear hero with some common sense never seems to emerge. It all boils down to wasted efforts all the way round.
The movie is rated R for profanity and violence.
Christian Bale can seemingly not give a bad performance, and he is totally believable in this role. Harrelson can make a mean villain even meaner with his sneering demeanor. Zoe Saldana should have had more to do in this film. She only has a few scenes and that is a shame. The same is true of Forrest Whitaker. Casey Affleck has the second lead and he makes the most of it.
This is a movie where the acting talent is not the problem. The fault is with the scriptwriter and the director. In this movie they both fall down on the job leaving the audience in the lurch. There’s a lot of potential here but not much execution.
I scored “Out of the Furnace” a hot air 5 out of 10.
