Destroyer

**Starring... Nicole Kidman's Wig and Fake Crow's Feet** The final moments of this film came with what was supposed to be a dramatic fade out of the haggard, liver-spot riddled face of the protagonist evaporates into what is supposed to be wave of glorious white light. Only there is no glory in this film. As we are reminded at the end as we stare at the barely human image of latex over-spray clogging Ms. Kidman's nostrils, we have to wonder what would have possessed her to take this role. Most of her acting in the film consists of her proving apparently that beautiful actresses who collectively spend the GDP of a small nation to look forever young can play dress-up and do boring and ugly on request. I found it to be an affront to both quality acting and homely women. The plot is a redemption arc turned on its head with a twist of non-linear story-telling and "hide the salami" which attempts to maintain the audience interest by forcing to piece together who is who and what happened when. Not in a nose-bleed Tenet way, but in an "OMG! I can't believe that's Nicole Kidman!" way. Ms. Kidman plays a leather-skinned, bag-of-bones alcoholic who belongs in a trailer park! Could the producers have found a powerhouse actress to carry this film without 10 pounds of latex applied to her face? Of course. But in recognition of how flimsy the plot line was, they opted to follow the trend of other productions (e.g., Guy Piece playing Peter Weyland under more latex than his body weight) who prefer to retain a-list stars. The shock and awe of Ms. Kidman's appearance wears off after about the thirteenth close up of her staring into space looking tired and haggard and walking like her legs have atrophied. As bad as that sounds, it gets worse. The moralizing (and there is constant moralizing) in this film is not just confused, but goes nowhere. The good mom-bad mom idea fails as we have no clue about why Kidman's character didn't manage to do something at least somewhat decent for her daughter sometime in her life. I guess that's because she's a drunk? The greedy/haunted cop angle also goes nowhere because other than putting two nice looking individuals together in the flashbacks, there is almost no indication of chemistry between Kidman's character and her sadly absent baby-daddy that we can believe in any kind of character arc leading to her ostensible self-destruction. Getting back to what is supposed to pass for a plot, something shows up from the past in the old drunk cop's life. That's original! Old cop is apparently suffers PTSD related to an undercover op gone bad. That's original too. Breadcrumbs are dropped slowly but pointedly so that there is never any confusion about the things you are supposed to piece together. When first twist finally comes, you'll find it so obvious that might actually overlook the fact that the clue that was left at the crime scene makes absolutely no sense. A the second twist (which involves more flexing by the make-up artists) arrives immediately thereafter, and you are meant to feel a sense of loss for the protagonist, but my reaction was to curse screenwriter's for making me sit through what was essentially mental (and visual) masturbation. I think I just threw up a little visualizing that scene again. It is also worth noting that for an a-list production like this, the production team was a little sloppy with their set dressings. Unless Ms. Kidman's character is supposed to be 65, there should not be any big 1980s station wagons parked in bank parking lots like that's a car ordinary people were driving. In the cell phone department, they take us back to the pre- iPhone era, but why even have cell phones in the flashbacks? The only way the story works is if the flashbacks are supposed to happen around 1980 (i.e., the production team went out and got the right cars) but if the current day of the story is around 2005-2010 with Nokia phones (which also fits with Kidman's police force driving around in crown vic... something you don't see much of in 2020), then the station wagons are wrong. I suspect the timeline of the plot got muddles when the "out-of-control teenage daughter" plot thread was added, which could be integrated easily with the addition of smartphone technology, otherwise the plot would have been bogged down by "where's my daughter" scenes. Bottom line: save yourself the frustration and revulsion of enduring this film. Send a message to Hollywood that if they want to have diverse heroines of all ages and appearances, they should try casing diverse women into lead roles. If you are looking for a modern entry in the neo-noir genre, I recommend the overlooked "Small Town Crime", or alternatively if you'd like to watch a focused, credible treatment of a self-destructive drunk cop suspense film, and don't mind subtitles, check out "No Rest for the Wicked" (original title "Paz Para Los Malvados").