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GOD IS A BULLET
Director: Nick Cassavetes Cast: Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, Maika Monroe, Karl Glusman, January Jones, Jamie Foxx, Paul Johansson, David Thornton, Jonathan Tucker, Ethan Suplee MPAA
Rating: Running Time: 2:35 Release Date: 6/23/23 (limited) |
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Review by Mark Dujsik | June 22, 2023 The protagonist of God Is a Bullet, a police detective in a little all-American town, isn't much of an investigator, as his boss makes clear near the start of this story. It turns out that he's not much of anything, either as a professional or a person, and that means writer/director Nick Cassavetes' adaptation of Boston Teran's novel doesn't function too well as a thriller, while also having a general vacuum of personality on top of it. That latter flaw has little to do with the cast, which does what they can with this harsh and occasionally brutal tale about a detective working to investigate and infiltrate a Satanic cult in order to find his abducted daughter. Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, a fine actor and a usually compelling presence on screen, plays the generically named Bob Hightower, an equally generic protagonist for this sort of material. He's a cop, yes, although the fact that he isn't a particularly skilled one feels more like an excuse for the movie's logical inconsistencies than a function or gimmick of the plot. The man is also a devout Christian, a fact that's repeated in the dialogue and, with only that, treated as some layer of depth to the character and this story, so he's triply at odds with the so-called Path of the Left Hand. Not only do they commit multiple murders in contrast to his enforcement of the law and have they kidnapped his teenage daughter, but they also worship the devil as an affront to his deepest-held religious convictions. It may be an all-too convenient setup, but there's some balance to it, at least. Most of this movie, though, is setup for a string of confrontations between Bob and the cult, as well as an inherently anti-climactic showdown with the story's real villains, who have put that cult in Bob's path. By the end of the movie's dual climaxes, it mainly feels as if both set of villains are just unlucky that they've caught Bob on one of his more fortunate streaks of not being entirely incompetent. Bob finds himself at odds with the Path of the Left Hand after their members, led by Cyrus (Karl Glusman), murder his ex-wife, her new husband, and abduct Bob and the ex's teenaged daughter Gabi (Chloe Guy). With the police investigation hitting a dead end, Bob receives a bit of luck when he's contacted by Case Hardin (Maika Monroe). She is indeed a hard case, having escaped from the cult after being kidnapped by them as a child and living in constant fear that they might find her one day. After a couple meetings and some convincing, Bob gets Case to join him in his search for Gabi, since the former cult member knows the players, their contacts, and their usual hangouts. There obviously isn't much to explain about this plot, even though the primary focus of the movie is its plotting. This is basically the usual formula of our protagonists discovering a lead, following it to yet another, and following that one still to even more. One of those leads, for example, is a mysterious tattoo artist known as the Ferryman (Jamie Foxx), who covers Bob in ink so that his ill-conceived plan to fit in with the cult falls apart a few minutes after it begins instead of instantly, and another is the whiny drug dealer Errol Grey (Jonathan Tucker), who plays both sides and whose name only sounds like a bad pun. Cyrus and his goons catch on to Bob pretty quickly (and are able to track him with such ease that we wonder if they actually have contact with the supernatural), so the absence of suspense makes the wait for eruptions of bloody violence even more dull. It's clear that Cassavetes is counting on the sinister nature of the cult, which makes a habit of kidnapping girl and murdering them in ritual sacrifice, and the enigma of some of these characters to compensate for the predictable plotting. To be sure, the cult is creepy, although the portrayal of them is so over-the-top that the threat of them is entirely superficial. Monroe's character is easily the most fascinating one here, and her performance is grounded in an understated level of vengeful trauma. It's a shame, then, that Case is mostly a plot device, meant to offer as much exposition as those other leads and become a damsel for Bob to rescue at one point. The whole of God Is a Bullet is moody and disturbing on the surface. The movie's look and feel, though, are as thin as its characters, plotting, and philosophical musings. Copyright © 2023 by Mark Dujsik. All rights reserved. |
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