SEVEN PSYCHOPATHS (Martin McDonagh). See times. Rating: NNN
Having made a huge splash with his 2008 hit-men-in-hiding drama In Bruges, Martin McDonagh returns four years later with this shaggy-dog comedy about blocked Irish screenwriter Martin (Colin Farrell), whose life becomes a raging sea when his best friend (Sam Rockwell) kidnaps the dog of an unhinged mobster (Woody Harrelson) in a half-baked ransom scheme.
The meta-trickery around which McDonagh builds the movie doesn’t pay off, so structurally Seven Psychopaths is kind of a mess. And casting Christopher Walken, so memorable in both True Romance and Pulp Fiction, doesn’t do much to distance McDonagh from the “Tarantino knockoff” cloud that shadowed In Bruges.
That said, if you enjoy it for what it is – an insubstantial but endearing goof on genre clichés, with knockout supporting turns by Walken, Harrelson and the always delightful Rockwell – it certainly has its moments.
Also, Tom Waits is in it, holding a rabbit. That’s more adorable than you’d think.