The Little Things (2021)
(On Cable TV, June 2021) Once in a while, a film goes out of its way to irritate its audience. This usually takes the form of a film that deliberately sets out to break the rules of formula storytelling. As much as many loathe to admit it, the reason why genre fiction uses formulas is that formulas work: they are distillations of many previous attempts to satisfy audiences and leave them with a positive impression of what they’ve seen. For instance, an integral component of crime fiction for more than a century has been the release of catching/punishing the evildoer. Screenwriters can choose to make a point and not punish the villain, and the audience can choose to make a point and hate the result. So it is that The Little Things (not adapted from a novel, surprisingly enough) sets out to unbolt the familiar assumptions of crime fiction. Its protagonist is a doomed man, condemned to replay a mistake made years before. He interacts uneasily with a younger man who doesn’t seem to need his mentorship. The mood is grim, the epiphanies are few and the finale is guaranteed to create reactions on a scale of annoyance to infuriation. The execution is slick, mind you: writer/director John Lee Hancock is after a few specific emotions and he certainly gets them, with the support of capable actors such as Denzel Washington, Rami Malek and Jared Leto. The Little Things is a grim crime thriller that deliberately refuses satisfaction. Viewers will decide whether this is something they want, but let’s not bet much on the long-term popularity of this film.
