Postman blue movie#
LaBute indicates the passage of time with a steady stream of title cards that say things like “Not long after that” and “Two or three weeks later,” and Hank Azaria gives an over-the-top performance as Connor’s probation officer, who spends the entire movie wearing a windbreaker with “probation” written on the back in large capital letters. Nicholson (whose father Jack starred in the 1981 film version of The Postman Always Rings Twice) and Kruger have no chemistry, and Nicholson fails to convey Connor’s romantic and sexual passion, or his anguish over a past that involves a stint in prison for an impulsive act of violence. When Connor finally suggests that he could kill Marilyn’s husband while she and her teenage stepdaughter (Chase Sui Wonders) are out of town, it almost sounds like an afterthought. The older woman and younger man are instantly drawn to each other when they first meet at a secluded beach, and when Marilyn visits Connor at his library job, seeking crime stories about women killing their husbands, he steers her toward Cain.Īnyone can guess where this is going, but LaBute draws out the plodding romance with antiseptic, deeply unerotic sex scenes, while Marilyn meekly demurs about the bruises that she says come from her wealthy, abusive husband.
It’s of special interest to the improbably named Marilyn Chambers (Diane Kruger), an unhappy housewife who’s new to the small Rhode Island town where Connor Bates (Ray Nicholson) has spent most of his life. Cain’s classic crime novel The Postman Always Rings Twice early and often. In both cases, he’s let down by his own clumsy writing, low production values, and weak performances.īoth movies also wear their literary influences on their sleeves, and in Out of the Blue, the characters reference James M. In Out of the Blue, LaBute applies those themes to a shoddy film noir pastiche, while in House of Darkness, he places them in a slightly more effective Gothic mood piece. Of the two, House of Darkness engages more directly with LaBute’s familiar themes of gender and sexual politics, although both are about devious, dangerous women manipulating dumb, horny men. It would be great to report that Out of the Blue and House of Darkness represent a return to form for LaBute, or even that they’re worth watching, but neither movie reaches that level. Before this current doubleheader, he hadn’t written or directed a feature film since 2015’s Dirty Weekend. He’s also continued to work in theater, where he got his start and where most of his most provocative ideas seem to have gone, although there have been cancellations of s ome of his plays amid rumors of inappropriate behavior.
Postman blue series#
Since then, LaBute has worked extensively in TV, as the creator of Syfy series Van Helsing and the showrunner of The I-Land, possibly the worst-reviewed series in Netflix history. Those movies aren’t bold or challenging, just misguided. His 2006 Nicolas Cage-starring version of The Wicker Man has become notorious for its entertaining awfulness. LaBute was tackling toxic masculinity before the widespread use of that term, and films like In the Company of Men, Your Friends & Neighbors, and The Shape of Things were alternately thought-provoking and infuriating.īut like a lot of successful independent filmmakers, LaBute made a bumpy transition to the mainstream, working as a director-for-hire on forgettable efforts like the comedy remake Death at a Funeral and the thriller Lakeview Terrace. LaBute’s cynicism and misanthropy was often bracing, even if his depiction of misogyny could blur the line between critique and endorsement. The writer-director debuted as part of the 1990s Sundance-fueled wave of independent filmmakers with his 1997 feature In the Company of Men, which announced a bold and controversial new voice. It’s been a long time since a new movie from Neil LaBute was an indie-film event-even two new movies in two weeks, as he’s just delivered with Out of the Blue and House of Darkness.
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