CineCritic2517 Hill plays a journalist interviewing a murderer during his trial played by Franco. Vague exchanges take place while the two main characters apparently become friends. At some point the movie ends, without a point and without any real story or a hint of subplot.Apart from it not having a story to tell, The films sports a most terrible script uttered by totally uninteresting characters in scenes that are systemically too long. None of the characters are believable, ruining the film's main plot point. Especially Hill's character makes zero sense. You can't be an investigative reporter and then be that naive. A friendship emerging from such shallow, boring and fake conversations, is also not credible. And what was the character of the wife even doing in this movie? She seemed to be his sister at first. Recommended viewing speed: 4X

iainthepict I watched this movie without being aware, beyond the two-line summary on Sky Movies, of the real-life events it supposedly portrayed. Amusingly enough, echoing the theme of the film, the summary was a little liberal with the truth. Longo didn't steal Finkel's identity. It wasn't identity theft. Longo simply used Finkel's name. Also, the time-line of when Longo did that was a bit murky. I guess we have to assume he'd read Finkel's NYT articles, up to an including the one with that stretched the truth, before he absconded to Mexico. On the whole, this film failed to deliver, on several counts, despite keeping my attention 'til the end. I guess I expected more, and kept hoping... The film posits the idea that the two undoubtedly flawed men had something in common i.e., they both indulged in lying, but to suggest their 'sin' was somehow equivalent is preposterous. Longo's approach to lying seemed to be compulsive and manipulative, whilst Finkel made one mistake. There is no suggestion in the film that Finkel was a persistent liar and, therefore, the idea that there were such similarities between the two lacks credibility. Only one man spun endless webs of lies, and if this movie is about deception, Finkel isn't the major culprit. Finkel's one lie was made with the best of intentions, albeit he breached the ethics of journalism. His purpose was honourable and what he did amounted to little more than a white lie. Turning the plot on such a line is stretching a thin idea to breaking point. This film is supposed to be about relationships, but one at least wasn't fleshed out in any meaningful way. At first, I though Finkel's wife was his sister; their interactions being more platonic than romantic. Whatever relationship they had wasn't obvious, and when it deteriorated, as it seemed to do, there was nothing substantial on screen to illustrate why. I got the impression she was unimpressed by the amount of time Finkel spent with Longo, but apart from pained looks, there were no further clues, either in the dialogue or in the characterisation. Speaking of dialogue, the flattery to which Finkel succumbs is surely juvenile writing. OK, there's only an hour and a half in which to present the story, but seriously, are we to believe a grown man was taken in by Longo's schoolboy rhetoric? Then we're led to believe that Finkel swaps journalism tips for Longo's story, ostensibly getting behind his facade and uncovering the true story behind the brutal murder of his wife and children. But there are no journalism tips, bar advice to avoid double negatives and a couple of parlour games. That advice comes back into play later, during a courthouse scene, but if it's meant to be a figurative, revealing moment, it falls short of any profundity. In fact, it's an embarrassingly banal moment. The true story is that, far from being a hard-nosed, investigative journalist, Finkel comes across as a gullible idiot. This is a drama, but its twists and turns are pretty much contrived. After Finkel gets a twinge of conscience and agrees to let the policeman have the information he got from Longo, we are left wondering just what that information was. We're not told, and if we're to surmise, there were no clues in the preceding hour. Nothing Longo told Finkel on screen up to that point could be construed as confessing to the murders and if he did as much in his writing to Finkel, we couldn't tell, because we weren't party to that content. Beyond a few frames in which we are presented with illustrated pages filled with moody and macabre images, which probably gave an insight into Longo's psyche, we can only speculate as to their written content, let alone the clues they supposedly presented. We are not shown enough of that content to put together the pieces of the puzzle. There was nothing substantive there. The audience might waver between guilty and not guilty, which means there was some drama, but this is not a psychological thriller with myriad twists and turns. Longo was playing mind games with Finkel, that's for sure, but if the former was the superior in terms of the psychological relationship, the latter was incredibly stupid. Neither the dialogue nor the acting built up that relationship to any effective level. The conversations between the two are well short of fascinating. We were left to assume that Finkel had been fooled, until the rather too obvious hint comes in through the disembodied voice of the Harper Collins publisher, who posed a leading question. This true story was nowhere near as interesting as it sounded. Finkel's tale of how he was taken in by Longo might be true, but it's pretty ordinary and if anything, damming of his professional ability. Far from being a journalist with a future, Finkel seems to have set a low standard and failed to achieve it. I pity anyone who's read the book.

alindsay-al I have wanted to see this film for a while and I have finally had the chance to see it and I thought it was great. The premise of the film sees a disgraced journalist get in touch with a criminal using his name to understand him. Jonah hill is a great comedic actor but he puts on a fantastic dramatic performance in this film. I saw a completely different side to him in this film as this damaged guy truly owns the screen in this whole film. James franco plays the criminal in this film and he does a great job in this film. He plays a twisted character and you never really know where he is coming from because he is such a deep conflicted character. Felicity jones plays hills wife in the film and she does a good job in this film with some powerful scenes. Everybody else in the film does a good job helping make this feel like a real situation. The story of the situation between hill and franco is really interesting and it builds into an uncomfortable situation. The script has some great drama that builds between these two characters to high levels. But I do feel like this film could have maybe done with a bit more humour to lighten the mood at times. The style of the film is very intense and it keeps you engaged. However, the pacing of the film is pretty slow especially for the first half an hour that slows the film down. I think this is a great intense film that if you like dramas you should see.

Hitchcoc This film has been maligned by some for being too slow moving and having an unsatisfying ending. This is a common rant by some. This is a very well presented portrayal of a relationship between two men who are more alike than different. Michael Finkel is a disgraced reporter. He gets fired from the New York Times for shortcutting a story. His reputation is pretty much shot until he gets a call from a man, Christian Longo, who has been accused of murdering his wife had his three children. A bond develops between them and Finkel, but is this man a truth teller or pathological liar and murderer. This is what Finkel must sort out. In the process, an obsession occurs, where he investigates to the exclusion of everything else. The acting is superb and the story easily holds one's interest to the bitter end. I believe that getting there is twice the fun and if the conclusion didn't satisfy people, I feel they missed out on something pretty unique.