Two For Your Money

Pacino plays a quirky father figure to a young rookie type, has a few wacky lines, then does a growly-voiced yelling session at the end with his arms flailing like a monkey and his hips moving back and forth. Sound familiar? That's because it's the same phucking movie Pacino's been doing for years, only now it's called "Two For the Money."

Matthew McCounaghey's not much of an actor, but he's a likeable guy, which has kept him working and kept us from wanting to smack his dumb ass ever since he commenced playing himself over and over and over and over and over after "Dazed and Confused." He's just as likeable here, and there are some shots of him with his shirt off for the girls/gay dudes.

Anyway, he plays Brandon Lange, an injured football player who takes up sports handicapping and makes a name for himself in Vegas. When Pacino hires him and brings him to New York, his name gets changed to John Anthony, because Pacino (sorry Al, can't address you as your character's name, penalty for sitting on those acting chops instead of using them for too long now -- godammit, man, you were Serpico once) thinks it sounds more powerful.

From there, Brandon (John) becomes a hotshot sports handicapper in the big apple, getting lots of money and praise from bigwigs. But after a while, he loses himself. His dad's calls get blocked by Pacino to keep Brandon from thinking about anything but the games. Brandon gets mad, but then the whole father subplot is forgotten and passed off for having to do with how Brandon is redeeming his father by helping someone who plainly isn't his father. Brandon's mom hangs up on him after showing up for one scene to complain that he has sent her "a little too much money," to which Brandon says, "My mom just hung up on me," then forgets about her completely like the movie does.

Quite a few scenes and tiny little subplots end awkwardly like this, with lines or conclusions that have one saying "What the --" and being cut off by the next flashy scene that has yelling and cheering for the next football game on television everyone has bet on and that we're automatically supposed to care about. Somewhere in this jumble of redundant crap and Heineken advertising (it's one thing to plug a product, it's another to have everyone in the damn movie drinking nothing but Heineken for two hours), a story about the love of good ol' American football and how we need to remember that it's more important than money gets woven in.

Will John Anthony find himself again and remember that he's Brandon Lange by the end? Will he? Will he realize how important the little things are and stop being a slave to money? Will he lose this terrible ego he's given and maybe teach Pacino a little something about life? If you're not sure, congratulations, you're a phucking moron. Just mail me the money you would've blown on the ticket, I promise I'll put it to better use (like making a bonfire with it and then pissing on the ashes).

It does have some moments, but they're forgotten quickly. It could have been a fun/harmless flick if it were an hour and a half, not two whopping, please-take-this-film-seriously-as-a-new-contribution-to-the-art-form hours. Whether this was a comedy or a drama is beyond me, just like whether the ending was supposed to be touching or clever. Probably both. Both endings were pretty gay though ("gay" meaning the old-fashioned, phuck-all-PC-whiners "gay," not "homosexual" -- calm down).

All in all, McCounaghey will work again, but there's a reason he'll keep taking second billing to people like J Lo. Pacino, hey, why not, he's Pacino. Too bad that's the extent of his powers now, seeing as how he used to be an actual actor who could fit himself into different kinds of roles. Rene Russo's still looking good for her age and solid, so we'll see her too. I am so excited writing this. These are the movies that keep me going in life. Socks. I have to wash my socks now. So many. So dirty. Damn it.

Oh, and I forgot Jeremy Piven, he's in it too, and Jeremy Piven is simply a phucking under-appreciated force of talent, so it's imperative that he be mentioned and paid homage too, no matter how pointless his character ends up being. Like his co-star, Armande Assante, Piven plays a guy who looks like he may be taking the hero down, but disappears before any real drama occurs.

Assante, playing a million-dollar-a-game better who suffers Brandon's down cycle phase and loses 13 million dollars, shows up to pee on him. He tracks Brandon down with a thug in a remote area of Central Park, tells him he knows where he lives, where his family lives, that he's very angry about his money being gone, then pees on him. No threat to the family. No "start picking some winners and make me my money back by the end of the flick or you're dead." He just pees on him. He finds out everything there is to know about Brandon just to pee on him. He wastes the time and money to gain absolute power over Brandon's life just to pee on him and then never show his face again for the rest of the movie. It just goes back to Brandon finding himself and the drama between Pacino and his wife. Armande pees on him. That's it. He pees on him. I know. I just don't understand it either. All I know is, I think I'd rather be peed on than have to sit through a sequel to this movie.

(Two bongs. No, three. No, one. No, two. Whatever.)