No Sudden Move

I made the mistake of watching this film after I read the reviews and expected them to be accurate. Big mistake. The story line is convoluted but the acting and camera work is first rate. Fans of noir will appreciate it. As a humorous aside, Jon Hamm comes very close to morphing into Don Draper near the end as he accepts a bottle of high end booze for his government work.

Veteran director Steven Soderbergh's '50s-based crime-drama "No Sudden Move" has a fine cast & upbeat noir tone, but is swamped by Ed Solomon's convoluted script ("Chinatown"-lite). Don Cheadle, Benicio Del Toro & tv's enigmatic Kieran Culkin (underused) are hired (via Brendan Fraser) by mobsters Ray Liotta (married to Julia Fox) and/or Bill Duke for a job involving David Harbour & family (inc Noah Dupe)... which goes awry, attracting cop Jon Hamm & slick corp fixer Matt Damon, as they all twist & turn on each other (or do they?) over growing $$$ and a catalytic converter conspiracy. Ambitious & entertaining, but ultimately too confusing.

No Sudden Move is very much the sort of film you can expect from Steven Soderbergh: acomplicated crime scheme(involving numerous A-listers), with hidden intentions stacked on each other and all done with a distinct style. However, this movie's biggest setback is that this time the 'clever' plot goes a little too far. Even the most keen and attentive viewer will have issues following and eventually will probably be left behind by the ever evolving and frankly indiscernible story.

First "Kimi" and now this as huge disappointments from Soderbergh who seemingly lost his mojo. Slow, messy, uninteresting, pretentious. Felt like 4 hours. There's only one scene in the whole movie I actually felt some tension, and it was in the first 30 minutes, otherwise, characters telling boring things about persons and events we are supposed to care or comprehend but we get so confused that we can't.

Was really disturbed to read a negative review of this film from someone who apparently does not know the difference between anamorphic widescreen and fisheye lenses. Soderbergh is a slavish cineaste of the first order, of technical virtuosity few could hope to match. I would have to assume all of his decisions as cinematographer and editor (under not so secret pseudonyms) as well as being director were explicitly and intentionally acts of artistic agency. We as a community of movie lovers ought to embrace and celebrate the efforts of these masters while they're still sufficiently motivated to contend with the cumbersome tasks of making art out of commercial spaces.

Anamorphic widescreen has a distorting effect at the peripheral ends. This would be correct for the period and a call back to the films of the era. I can understand how this would be distracting to the uninformed viewer, but just think for a moment about the fact that the auteur knew you would notice. Then, just for a moment, ask yourself why Soderbergh is pointing this out to me?