George Clooney He is known primarily for his acting side, but since his behind-the-scenes debut with ‘Confessions of a dangerous mind’ He has already shot several titles as a director. His best work in that facet is still ‘Good evening, and good luck’, but the really important thing is that for years – since ‘The Ides of March’ – he has not offered us any really interesting feature film as a director.
Both ‘Monuments Ment’ and ‘Suburbicon’ and ‘Midnight Sky’ were more or less disappointing works, and I am afraid that I cannot speak in very favorable terms about ‘The Tender Man’, a title that Amazon Prime Video It premiered this Friday, January 7. Clooney tells a story here coming-of-age in which highlights Ben Affleck Y That does not start at all bad but then ends up being too conventional.
We have already seen this
Adaptation of the book by JR Moehringer, ‘The Tender Bar’ is the story of how a boy copes with the absence of his father and reaches maturity. Something that we have already seen or read on many occasions, so it is essential both what unique details it provides and how to narrate it to be able to catch our attention.
The film never offers anything that feels novel, but it works more or less well for its first few minutes, focused on showing the reality of its young protagonist. There it is benefited by having a curious gallery of characters that add some sauce, especially That guy played by Affleck and the bar he works at.
There ‘The Tender Bar’ flows with enough ease for one to be carried away by the charm it seeks to convey despite the fact that Clooney’s work behind the cameras sins of excessive neatness -a more classic and calm finish is sought but lacking any type of voice of its own-, but a narrative decision makes everything that could have been achieved blows up.
A slump from which he never recovers
I am referring to the moment in which we get to know the adolescent version of the main character, since that more intimate and familiar touch is lost to the benefit of an impossible romance and the typical frustration of a writer trying to find his own voice. Everything is a bit monotonous and Tye sheridan he never succeeds in giving the character the necessary depth for us to connect with his emotional journey.
To put it another way, ‘The Tender Bar’ lacks the force that can convey the genuine to give rise to a story that we already know by heart. With the jump of a more than correct Daniel ranieri to Sheridan, the film commits a misstep from which it never recovers. Nor is it that it does anything particularly wrong, but it does become one of those movies in which you don’t care a bit the same and indifference is never a sign of anything good.
That leads to ‘The Tender Bar’ being a movie that feels tasteless, an especially serious problem due to the intentions of what he is telling us and that attracts more attention because it is something that he does achieve when Affleck makes an appearance. It is not that then everything becomes wonderful, but enough to see that it was his story that was really worth telling.
In short
‘The Tender Bar’ offers very little, since as a story of reaching maturity it feels repetitive and without force. And that does not start badly, but there comes a point where interest falls precipitously and then never recovers. In the end the only really inspiring thing to do is Ben Affleck’s good work on a supporting character. Better to forget about the rest.