MOVIE REVIEW - Savages

The latest movie from Oliver Stone is out, Savages.   It's another drug-dealing movie that deals with his view of the industry at large and how it works.

Savages has a pretty good cast with newcomers Blake Lively, Taylor Kitsch,  and Aaron Johnson.  Also oldcomers too like Salma Heyek, Benicio Del Toro and John Travolta.   It's a good mix of the new and the not so new as far as casting is concerned.  But one thing that isn't new is Stone's view on the world and how he tends to portray events within our society.

Savages is a pretty good story about these two young guys Ben (Johnson) and Chon (Kitsch).  Ben is highly educated from Berkly with double majors in Botany and Business.   And Chon is a former soldier from the Gulf War.  They are in the marijuana business, and are highly successful.  They make the greatest weed on the planet in their small operation.    They are both sleeping with and in love with O (Lively).  She is a beautiful young woman with a ton of troubles, and she has been swept up in their lives by living with them and lying to her parents about it.

Well, the Mexican drug cartels are unhappy about this business and they want to go into partnership with them. The refuse, and that's a big mistake.  They kidnap O, and the demands become larger and more unreasonable.   So our characters fight back and take on the cartel as best they can.  Will they get O back?

Savages has an agenda without question. Stone attempts to glorify the small marijuana business as a very good, successful business that "takes all the violence out of the drug business."   Ben especially is created very sympathetically as a genius that takes his drug money and goes all over the world creating charity missions in under developed nations.  He is a man of peace that only wants to sell his weed and live a happy life.   Chon is portrayed as a sort of out of control ex-soldier who needs Ben to stay focused.  They are both in love with O and both alright with each other sleeping with her in the same house.

The cartels of course are horrible and violent and they indeed are.  The leader Elena (Hayek) is a ruthless kingpin who orders murder after murder.   Her second in command  Lado (Del Toro) is terribly brutal.   Del Toro won and Oscar for Traffic, and he is superb here.   He one of Hollywood's best horrible character actors.  He is the shining star of this movie. 

Savages has it's moments of being really good, and that's fine.  But there is just such a bad approach to this story from Stone that I have a feeling it's actually a much better story than shown here.   It's hard to take a lot of this story seriously At times this is almost cartoonish especially the scenes within the "good drug business,"  although there are some compelling scenes here.  Travolta as the "on the take" government agent is pretty good, even though it's a small role. 

Savages.   Moments here and there good.  But overall, too long, and too laden with Stone. Wish this was in the hands of another.