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KIN
Directors: Jonathan Baker and Josh Baker Cast: Myles Truitt, Jack Reynor, James Franco, Zoë Kravitz, Dennis Quaid, Carrie Coon, Ian Matthews, Michael B. Jordan MPAA
Rating: Running Time: 1:42 Release Date: 8/31/18 |
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Review by Mark Dujsik | August 30, 2018 If it were a straightforward drama, Kin might have worked as a study of brothers forced into a perilous situation—one by circumstance, as well as a bunch of bad decisions, and the other by the other brother. Instead, the movie introduces a science-fiction element into the mix, which turns this story into something completely different. Daniel Casey's screenplay, based on fraternal directors Jonathan and Josh Baker's earlier short film "Bag Man," still focuses primarily on the relationship between the brothers, but the sci-fi part of the story also makes this an adventure involving a race against various dangerous forces, a power fantasy, and, ultimately, the origin story of a kid who discovers that, by some random workings of the universe, he's more special than he ever imagined and pretty much anyone else on the planet. With such a tale comes a degree of responsibility that an observant drama doesn't intrinsically possess. Something such as this, in which a 14-year-old boy discovers a piece of alien technology, immediately puts us into the head space of watching something akin to a parable. It's not merely about seeing how these characters think and act anymore. Now, with the addition of a fantastical element that removes the veneer of reality from the story, the tale is as much about the meaning behind those thoughts and actions. A drama, in theory, should show things and people as they are. A fantastical parable, which this movie becomes, is telling us how things and people should be. Here, those lessons don't feel too responsible. The story follows Eli (Myles Truitt), the adopted son of widower Hal (Dennis Quaid). He's a teenage boy having some problems fitting in and acting rightly. Most recently, he has been suspended from school for starting a fight with a student who said something about his deceased mother. He also takes copper wire from abandoned buildings throughout Detroit to make some money, and on one of his expeditions, he discovers a violent scene. A group of heavily armored soldiers lie dead in an empty factory, and while investigating, Eli finds a mysterious device—a metallic box that expands into a laser blaster with the touch of a button. The plot begins with the return of Eli's older brother and Hal's biological son, Jimmy (Jack Reynor), who has been in jail for six years for stealing. Jimmy owes $60,000 to local gangster/sociopath Taylor (James Franco), who threatens to kill Jimmy and his family if the debt isn't paid. Hal refuses to help his son steal the money from the construction company for which the father works. Jimmy takes matters into his own hands, and in the process, Hal and Taylor's older brother are shot and killed. To protect himself and Eli from the vengeful Taylor, Jimmy takes his younger brother on a road trip west to evade the gangster. Despite being the central character, Eli is mostly passive for a long while in this story. He's along for the ride with Jimmy, who—despite seeing his poor decisions result in his father's death and his current state of outrunning a ruthless killer, as well as the law—continues to make a series of bad choices. The crux is that he's now including his younger brother in his misdeeds, under the guise of teaching the boy how to be a man. Jimmy takes Eli to a strip club, where the two meet Milly (Zoë Kravitz), a dancer who takes a liking to the kid and offers him the sound advice that, maybe, his older brother isn't the best influence. If we think she's going to be the voice of reason, that's a mistake. The duo becomes a trio, and after Jimmy gets into a fight and loses the stolen money from the safe, Milly suggests that they rob the club's owner. By this point, Eli already has shown what the alien rifle can do—namely, blast large objects and send them flying. This establishes a strange lesson at the heart of the story: that a gun basically can solve any problem. It's a bit disturbing, seeing a 14-year-old kid pressured into life-or-death situations and criminal activity by a sibling he admires and, then, giving him a weapon that can turn an entire human body into a plume of ash. We learn this, of course, because eventually Eli has to turn the alien gun on another human being. The movie's morality is strange. It has Hal, before being shot to death, trying to instill responsibility into his younger son, and it has Jimmy as the struggling antithesis of all of those lessons. There's a solid dynamic here—two examples that Eli could follow. Instead, Kin takes the situation into the realm of deadly consequences with the ruthless Taylor, meaning that there will, inevitably, be violence. Eli's decision is much less about which role model he'll follow. It's much, much more about whether or not he'll be able to kill a bunch of goons with alien technology when the situation all but requires such violence. That's not a particularly responsible lesson. Copyright © 2018 by Mark Dujsik. All rights reserved. |
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(for gun violence and intense action, suggestive material, language,
thematic elements and drinking)
