If you had any doubt that American filmmaking is currently in the worst place imaginable, then summer 2022 should dissipate any doubts. As it stands, the best-reviewed big studio films have been “Top Gun: Maverick,” “Nope,” “Elvis” and “The Black Phone.” Yikes. If anything, now, more than ever, to find great movies you have to be adventurous and seek them out at the local arthouse theater: “Happening,” “Watcher,” “Crimes of the Future,” “Pleasure,” and “Fire of Love.” With that being said, the last major studio blockbuster left to save this sad sack summer movie season is David Leitch’s “Bullet Train.” I can confirm this brainless action movie, clearly riffing on Leitch’s own “John Wick”, will not stand the test of time. It’s another disappointment in a summer movie season filled with them. “Bullet Train” has an ultra-slick Brad Pitt, delivering a dumbed-down popcorn movie performance. On the other hand, Aaron Taylor Johnson and Bryan Tyree Henry steal the show as “The Twins,” Tangerine and Lemon. Pitt’s character, trying to find some kind of inner zen, is on a bullet train filled with assassins. The resulting actions become a game of violent cat and mouse — a 2-hour barrage of non-stop onslaught and snide cleverness. “Bullet Train” arrives 10 years too late. If this movie were released before “Deadpool” and “John Wick,” then maybe it would have felt fresh and original, but we’re long past this type of action movie. What we’re left with is a semi-amusing array of double and triple crosses, in a film so forgettable that it instantly vanishes from memory minutes after having seen it. [C+] Contribute Hire me
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