I just saw this adaptation of Elmore Leonard's novel, "The Switch" off Amazon Prime the other day, and it's a winner! If you recall the 1997 Quentin Tarantino film, "Jackie Brown" (which was based on Leonard's novel, "Rum Punch"), this is sort of a prequel to that, using the same characters. John Hawkes and Yasiin Bey (AKA "Mos Def") play the same two characters Robert DeNiro and Samuel L. Jackson played in that earlier Tarantino picture. This time, they take for ransom the wife (Jennifer Aniston) of a wealthy man (Tim Robbins), who they believe will cough up some big dough for her, but upon realizing what's going on, she doesn't believe the money will be coming through.
The heart of this film is the relationship between Hawkes and Aniston, who develop a sorta romantic thing while this whole ordeal is going on. I first remember Hawkes as the "Crab Shack" guy on an early '90s episode of "Wings", but wow, in recent years has he come into his own as a film actor- with the likes of movies such as "The Surrogate", "Me and You and Everyone We Know", etc.. Well, anyway, that's the reason to check out this movie, plus like with most Leonard-based films- so much going on at once- and a lot of fun in a darkly-comic-film-noir-type way. Thumbs up!
The heart of this film is the relationship between Hawkes and Aniston, who develop a sorta romantic thing while this whole ordeal is going on. I first remember Hawkes as the "Crab Shack" guy on an early '90s episode of "Wings", but wow, in recent years has he come into his own as a film actor- with the likes of movies such as "The Surrogate", "Me and You and Everyone We Know", etc.. Well, anyway, that's the reason to check out this movie, plus like with most Leonard-based films- so much going on at once- and a lot of fun in a darkly-comic-film-noir-type way. Thumbs up!