NEWS-FINANCE -QUOTE-EDUCATIONAL AND MOTIVATIONAL
Back in the 2000s or early 2010s, a film like Eenie Meanie would have been a late summer theatrical play, a mid-budget star vehicle with enough genre elements to hopefully lure back the blockbuster crowd. There are car chases and shootouts with absurdly attractive people in the middle of them and recognisable “that guy from” faces surrounding. But even back then it would have been a gamble without an A-lister attached, the film probably going the way of the many non-Fast & Furious car flops like Driven, Speed Racer, Drive Angry and Need for Speed.
Now, it’s a much more obvious, and far safer, fit for streaming, with Disney wisely nudging this one to a Hulu/Disney+ premiere. Eenie Meanie still has the feel of something that was once on a bigger screen, though, with a reported $50m budget edging it above many of the season’s multiplex offerings (more than say Weapons, Nobody 2, Materialists or Freakier Friday). Exactly how and why this particular package was deemed worthy of such an unusual spend (in this climate!) is a bit of a head-scratcher, as the film is a mildly diverting yet strangely dated caper, a watered-down Tarantino rip-off without a soul of its own.
It’s the feature debut of writer-director Shawn Simmons, who created the one-and-done action series Wayne and co-created John Wick spin-off The Continental, both shows not really leaving that much of an impression. But the former was exec-produced by Paul Wernick and Rhett Reese, the duo who co-wrote the Deadpool series, and they have also shepherded this one, with the franchise’s almost $3bn gross granting them a certain amount of special treatment at Disney. The smug irreverence of those films is mercifully kept in check here (the humour is more misfiring than actively annoying) but there’s a similar balance of action and comedy that’s also come to typify their work elsewhere. The pair have also written the execrable streaming duds 6 Underground and Ghosted (their finest work, by a considerable amount, is their smart, terrifying Alien riff Life).
Simmons’s script is marginally better than their worst and he does have an uncanny ability to construct genuine surprises, especially in the first act, but his sharp left turns soon fade and the journey ahead becomes a little too obvious. The star in the vehicle is Samara Weaving, the Australian Home and Away actor turned model turned genre mainstay best known for films like Ready or Not, The Babysitter and Scream VI. She plays Edie, an unlikely getaway driver, trained from a young age, nicknamed Eenie Meanie, who has turned her back on a life of crime, choosing the straight and narrow. But she’s dragged back in by her troublesome ex-boyfriend (Karl Glusman) whose latest mistake reunites her with former boss (Andy Garcia) and a far-fetched heist with life-or-death consequences.
It’s the old “one last job” tale, filled with an inevitable array of overly quirky characters (brief appearances from Randall Park, Marshawn Lynch, Steve Zahn and Jermaine Fowler) and dialogue that confuses swearing with actual jokes (the limp banter is almost entirely zinger-free). Formative shared history with Glusman’s handsome yet consistently awful ex (referred to as “the 9/11 of blocking human beings”) never quite explains why someone as smart and savvy as Edie/Eeenie would continue to risk everything for him. Glusman plays dumb well, although Weaving, struggling with an awkward midwestern accent, is a little indistinctive as a lead despite the flashy chaos that engulfs her. Their low-investment back-and-forth relationship can’t propel us through the more serious stretches, the film more effective when nothing or no one really matters.
When that is the case, when we’re fixed behind the wheel with $50m to spend, the film zips into action and Simmons is a dab hand at choreographing an involving and kinetic car chase. He also throws in another left-turn in the finale, one that’s initially daring yet ultimately unsatisfying as he doesn’t quite know where to take us next, leaving us with an endnote of unearned sentimentality. It’s a bumpy road for Eeenie and an even bumpier one for us.
