'Savages': Oliver Stone's mayhem feels like Quentin Tarantino movie
'Savages' review: Oliver Stone's violent movie keeps the eye engaged, if not the mind.
'Savages' actor John Travolta (l.) makes a cameo as a corrupt DEA agent.
Francois Duhamel/Universal Pictures/AP
Oliver Stone is back in form with 鈥淪avages,鈥� which will be good news only to those who liked Stone鈥檚 form to begin with. Based on the acclaimed 2010 novel by Don Winslow, it鈥檚 about a pair of extremely successful southern California pot growers, the blonde bimbo they share, and the vicious Mexican cartel that wants into the business. I suppose you could call it Stone鈥檚 version of 鈥淛ules and Jim,鈥� plus beheadings, torchings, bombings and strafings.
Chon (Taylor Kitsch) is an ex-Navy SEAL and his partner in crime is Ben (Aaron Johnson), who is as hang-loose as Chon is hot-wired. Together they鈥檝e built up a vast business derived from Afghanistan cannabis seeds that are exponentially more potent than the competition鈥檚. Ophelia (Blake Lively), or O, as she likes to be called, is their mutual love object. She likes being in the middle of the men. 鈥淔or me,鈥� she says 鈥渢hey are one big man.鈥� O, fittingly, is kidnapped by the cartel while shopping in the mall.
It's ironic that Stone, whose scripts for Alan Parker's "Midnight Express" and Brian De Palma's "Scarface" were a big influence on Quentin Tarantino, should have made a movie that seems like a Tarantino spin-off.
The torture quotient is high and the human consequences cartoonish. 鈥�Savages鈥� does keep the eye engaged, if not the mind. Salma Hayek, in a Cleopatra wig, has an over-the-top turn as the cartel鈥檚 leader, and Benicio Del Toro, looking more toothsome than usual, plays her henchman, a man so ruthless he鈥檚, well, amusing. (Truly bad guys are always more fun than bad guys.) John Travolta has a pungent cameo as a corrupt DEA agent.
鈥淪avages鈥� isn鈥檛 about anything except flashily directed mayhem. In this nest of vipers, it鈥檚 the slitheriest varieties that survive 鈥� at least for a time. Grade: B- (Rated R for strong brutal and grisly violence, some graphic sexuality, nudity, drug use and language throughout.)