The Gentlemen – 2020 – R
Just for fun stop by the snack bar and forego the popcorn for a giant salted pretzel to eat in sync with this movie’s spiraling twists, turns and twirls. Mickey (Matthew McConaughey), an American in London offers to sell his thriving British underground marijuana farms to fellow American billionaire, sleazy Matthew (Jeremy Strong, Succession) and blissfully exercise early retirement to fully enjoy Rosalind, Mickey’s stiletto-heeled wife (Michelle Dockery, Downton Abbey) who runs an auto-repair garage staffed exclusively by women. But the lucrative drug trafficking opportunity is chumming the River Thames luring all manner of hungry fresh water sharks to the city. Taking the bait is Chinese gangster “Lord George“ (Tom Wu) but his underboss “Dry Eye” (Henry Golding, Crazy Rich Asians), strutting his independence and representing the up and coming Asian gangsta youth movement, shoots a different plan to Lord George. Crooked private investigator/paparazzi reporter Fletcher (Hugh Grant) is cheerily dedicating his telephoto lens and camouflage expertise to blackmail Mickey’s #1 henchman Ray (Charlie Hunnam, Sons of Anarchy) by selling the unfolding, exclusive, murdering mob and dope tale to tabloid owner “Big Dave” (Eddie Marsan, Vice) who is determined to enact revenge on Mickey who publicly snubbed diminutive Big Dave at a highfalutin London party. Whew! There you have it. Full circle. Mickey to Matthew to Lord George to Dry Eye to Fletcher to Ray to Big Dave back to Mickey. Well, not quite. There is “Coach” (Colin Farrell), neighborhood legend boxing coach who winds up owing three favors to Mickey because Coach’s stable of brawling, YouTube viral-seeking karate kids overstepped their gym boundaries into Mickey’s business. Coach not only pays off his debt but throws in one machine gun rescue as a bonus fourth favor. Then there’s the Russian connection with former KGB czar daddy who takes exception to Aslan (Danny Griffin), his heir-apparent son face-planting the London sidewalk from two stories up, winding up in a body bag in Ray’s home freezer. On the heels of Aslan’s fall from fame is the demise of anorexic Laura (Eliot Sumner), daughter of Lord Pressfield (Samuel West). Lord Pressfield is an estate beneficiary of Matthew’s enterprise, a literal “overlord.” His income is cut off because of tangling with the karate kid gang but Mickey, trying to make amends, promises to rescue Laura who gets mixed up with Aslan and it’s a big heroin mess. Follow the Moscow Mule to the White Widow Super Cheese weed. Cannabis chaos.
The entire movie is framed as a conversation between manic Fletcher and deliberate Ray. Fletcher pitches to Ray, typed up as a screen play at a $20 million price tag, the damning, blackmailing evidence he’s clandestinely gathered. Ok? Got it? If it’s any comfort, it took me so long to diagnose the movie-within-a-movie format that I missed important clues flying by in the fast and furious dialogue. Fletcher talked way too fast and Ray way too slow. The British slang went over my head. I like to think of myself as able to cope with the circuitous but this movie took such a scenic route that I wished for an occasional linear respite. For all I know the movie-within-the-movie was the movie. Confused? Me, too. Maybe buy two pretzels.
