Robert De Niro seems to alternate between playing a caricatured version of his past roles and playing an actual part. Having seen the first trailer for the actor’s latest crime thriller The Bag Man, I could not quite decide which De Niro I was watching.
The Bag Man focuses on a crime boss (De Niro) who hires a man named Jack (John Cusack) to bring a bag to a seedy motel. According to the trailer, Jack had better not look in that bag, if he knows what’s good for him (I’m pretty positive that means that Jack is going to look in the bag). Unsurprisingly, things do not work out as they’re supposed to and the appearance of a shady prostitute, a criminal with an eyepatch, and a few other suspect characters make life rough for Jack.
The trailer has an attractive neo-noir vibe and a lot of mysterious conversations that could make for an interesting film. All of the typical generic characters are here, too, including the requisite femme fatale (Rebecca Da Costa) and some crooked cops. Still, with a cast that also includes Crispin Glover as the proprietor of the motel, there’s a lot that could be said for The Bag Man. It could go either way, as a rote and uninteresting crime thriller with De Niro at its nasty heart, or as a clever and manipulative entry into the genre. John Cusack and Robert De Niro are great actors to watch in almost anything, but I have to admit that they’ve both been phoning it in of late.
You can draw your own conclusions about De Niro and Cusack’s latest film by watching the trailer below, and letting us know what you think. Will The Bag Man be worth the price of admission, or are you going to wait for VOD? Let us know.
The Bag Man opens in limited release on February 28.
