‘Bribery’ Review: Money Talks – The New York Times


If you can stay awake until the last moments of “Windfall,” yes, something really exciting will happen. But that’s a long wait in Charlie McDowell’s oppressive Netflix drama, a gabby hostage movie with a single, enviable location and three unattractive characters.

A frozen opening image of the exterior of a luxury home in California foreshadows boredom to come. A filthy thief (played by Jason Segel at his most relentless) wanders lazily around the property, as if trying for greatness. He may be the most clumsy thief since the “Home Alone” idiots, but his lack of skill turns out to be irrelevant when the landlords, a tech billionaire and his wife (Jesse Plemons and Lily Collins) unexpectedly return and bow to his demands. money. Moreover, they even encourage him to raise the price he wants.

Filmed in Ojai in 2020 (not far from where McDowell filmed) 2014 movie “The Person I Love”), “Windfall” is strikingly flat and logically incomplete. While the three wait for the agreed-upon loot to arrive, the convoluted scenario (by Justin Lader and Andrew Kevin Walker) includes a ridiculous sauna lockdown and a surprise visit from an unlucky gardener. Multiple escape opportunities are overlooked, especially by the spouse who spends most of the movie lying down and looking fed up. It’s impossible to blame him.

Yet despite the tangled plot (who briefly wakes up in a sprint during a woodland chase) and the confusing camera, Plemons undermines his character’s arrogance to reveal something of a loathsome—for marriage, money, and his subjugation by a ludicrous intruder.

“Why do we keep acting like this man is a real threat?” he asked his wife angrily. he asks. He should probably be asking the screenwriters.

Windfall
Rated R for a greedy husband and crazy wife. Run time: 1 hour 32 minutes. Watch on Netflix.



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