The American Side

I hate it when writers throw a bunch of names at the beginning of a movie and expect their viewers to remember them all and their position/relation to each other throughout the whole thing.

A film so in love with the throwback noirs of the 70s and 80s (especially CHINATOWN) gets runs on the board, but it's a shame that the complicated and cluttered plot lacks the style and grace which distinguish the best of this genre; focus on the plot as opposed to the characters and characterisations ultimately muffle the film's impact; Stuhr's weak and bland leading performance doesn't help matters. Eclectic supporting cast are universally superb, with Broderick a standout as a slimy gangster.

I enjoyed the look-and-feel of it but once the story starts progressing it gets more and disjointed. They should have cut out some characters and/or sub-plot lines. The ending is just plain stupid. The whole Tesla premise should have been smeared out over several films. The first one could have set-up the PI and the different characters, while the subsequent films could have gone deeper into in all the theories/ideas and conspiracies that has been cramped into this one movie.