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Movie Review: Amsterdam

Mike Tyrkus

While Amsterdam may be far from writer/director David O. Russell’s finest work, it does provide an opportunity for some wonderful performances from Christian Bale, Margot Robbie, and John David Washington as well as an initial wave of euphoria in witnessing an artist attempt something spectacularly different from his usual milieu. 

Set in the year 1933, Amsterdam follows three friends (Bale, Robbie, and Washington) who find themselves awash in the machinations of one of the more surprisingly shocking cabals in American history. Told simultaneously through present and backstory vignettes that gradually explain character traits and plot points, the story often mirrors current events in a frighteningly ominous fashion (which is perhaps the point). Yet, at the same time, there is a nostalgic glaze at work upon the film that keeps the ethereal setting somewhat engaging and allows any shortcomings the film becomes entangled in to be easily overlooked until later rumination may heighten their egregiousness. 

David O. Russell, directing his first film since 2015’s Joy, also serves as screenwriter for Amsterdam. This double duty produces a script that weaves both fact and fiction into an intricate, though occasionally meandering (and perhaps frustrating to some), tale of espionage and government conspiracies that seemingly threaten to topple the world order rather easily. 

Although performances by stars Robbie, Bale, and Washington anchor the film and make for a believable trio whose friendship would seemingly propel such a story forward, other characters are afforded some time to chew the scenery and steal the scenes that they’re in (albeit all too briefly) – such as Taylor Swift and Rami Malek.  

Christian Bale, John David Washington, and Margot Robbie in “Amsterdam.” Photo by Courtesy of 20th Century Studios/Courtesy of 20th Century Studio – © 2022 20th Century Studios. All Rights Reserved.

Unfortunately, unlike Russell’s far more cohesive films like Silver Linings Playbook (2012) or The Fighter (2010), Amsterdam is content with echoing the aimless wandering the main characters seem to be pursuing in their quest for the perfect lives, before they are tragically torn apart from each other by the events of the real world. That lack of cohesion has a detrimental effect on one’s appreciation of the film after the fact as an attempt is made to extract sense from the nonsensical. 

Regardless of these critiques, it is far more interesting to watch a filmmaker like David O. Russell attempt to harness the unorthodox stylings of others, such as the Coen Brothers, to bring a new sensibility to his own brand of storytelling in something like Amsterdam, than it would be to see him simply produce more of the same type of work he had been effortlessly creating before.

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Mike Tyrkus

Editor in Chief at CinemaNerdz.com
An independent filmmaker, co-writer and director of over a dozen short films, the Editor in Chief of CinemaNerdz.com has spent much of the last three decades as a writer and editor specializing in biographical and critical reference sources in literature and the cinema, beginning in February 1991 reviewing films for his college newspaper. He was a member of the Detroit Film Critics Society, as well as the group's webmaster and one-time President for over a decade until the group ceased to exist. His contributions to film criticism can be found in Magill's Cinema Annual, VideoHound's Golden Movie Retriever (of which he was the editor for nearly a decade until it too ceased to exist), the International Dictionary of Films and Filmmakers, and the St. James Film Directors Encyclopedia (on which he collaborated with editor Andrew Sarris). He has also appeared on the television program Critic LEE Speaking alongside Lee Thomas of FOX2 and Adam Graham, of The Detroit News. He currently lives in the Detroit area with his wife and their dogs.

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