The Kill Room

Was not too ardous and partially entertaining, relatively funny in parts. Not being a lover of fine art I felt the 1 hour 40ish aperture into the world of the high brow art industry to be reassuringly confirmational of my previous understanding of the type of people who inhabit that world. Pretentious and somewhat pathetically obsessed with one upmanship. So nothing new there. The Movie itself was slightly farcical which may have been the intent. But I found it hard to believe the ease at which certain characters took their introduction to the world of organised crime. Overall I didn't feel as if my time had been stolen. But its only ever going to be experienced once as there is absolutely nothing that merits a revisit. Mediocre without being Awful.

The movie is not great, the critics are right about that. But you cannot understate what the actors gave us with the little they had. Samuel l jackson is as always giving out a very believable performance as crook gone art fraud, uma thurman was less believable as she stuttered at every businesslike word that was supposed to paint her as a serious art gallery owner. It was kind of hard to watch how played eccentricity can backfire . The side cast was doing a stellar job as well. I felt completely immersed in this bizarre and backwards underground art world. It just never came together, there was no real plot, awkward dialogue and a dissappointing ending. So not as bad as people would want you to believe but not good either.

The Kill Room is a crime satire set for slaying in the modern art world. Catering to an audience that might not be hip to those in jokes, director Nicol Paone wisely fills her canvas with the witty Samuel L. Jackson, the sexy Uma Thurman, and the chiseled Joe Manganiello. Although hung on stories seen before, The Kill Room is an entertaining enough piece worth a 98-minute glance in any cinematic gallery.

Scripted by Jonathan Jacobson, The Kill Room is amusing crime fiction wrapped in a comedic body bag as Reggie's murders eventually transform into avant-garde art. Reggie becomes known as the Bagman whose art, naturally, becomes more of a success than the laundering biz. The Kill Room itself then dips into a slight case of thievery as the plot follows Woody Allen's Small Time Crooks, which also features a cover business that becomes more of a success than the actual crime. As life imitates art, so too does art imitate art.

The Kill Room, like the art being satirized within, has clever subtext but lacks that deep impression. The movie successfully captures the transitory nature of art styles noting such as an allegory of movies as they exist within modern streaming services. The Kill Room itself might not present a shocking spectacle like the Bagman but when paired with a proper wine and cheese, could nicely kill off a Friday night.

Great to see Uma Thurman back on the screen, because she is such a wonderful actress. Where has she been all these past years? But however charming she (still) is, and however mildly amusing this movie is, it fails to become really laugh out loud funny.

Humor is personal, so perhaps others wont mind the cheap in your face jokes though, but I found them to be just a bit tiring.

The story is about Uma Thurman's money loosing art gallery. Then she meets Samuel L Jackson, who is part of a criminal enterprise with LOTS of money to launder. They start cooperating and then the story kinda tanks from there on...

Could have been better. Not bad, but defnitely not recommendable either if you are looking for a good laugh.

Seeking a better way of laundering his mafia connected money, Samuel L Jackson discovers that the world of art where value is relative is the perfect tool to achieve this. He engages with spiky gallery owner / art dealer Uma Thurman who herself is facing hard times, to run this, with his hit man colleague Joe Manganiello persuaded to start paining great avant-garde works. The difficulty is that filthy rich New Yorkers start showing an interest in the paintings and long to buy them much to the annoyance of Jackson's mafia pals.

Whilst it is nice to see Tarantino favourites Thurman and Jackson come together to nicely play off each other, this is rather a flat, cold story, hampered both by the rather tired comic convention that any old rubbish will pass as art in snobbish art circles plus it all leads to a bit of a feeble, unconvincing climax. Manganiello seems barely awake throughout, although the rest of the supporting cast are good fun. It is however Thurman, who is terrific here and Jackson, admittedly doing his usual shouty, sweary, Tarantinoesque character, that make this worth checking out.