Movies in Review: "Child 44"

When I watched the trailer for this film, I knew I was in for a hit. The trailer appealed to all of my senses as a fan of movie thrillers. Not to mention, Tom Hardy is cast in the starring role, with Gary Oldman in a supporting role. You may not have even been aware of this film release, I only saw the trailer once. It's based off a novel of the same name, Child 44 trailer. Recently released films have underwhelmed. I was looking forward to this movie bringing some life back into cinema.

Unfortunately, this was not the case...You can agree from the trailer the movie seems to have a strong plot that is intriguing, but the movie waters this  down and kills the story with too many unnecessary subplots. The focus of the movie gets almost completely lost with only sprinkles of the main storyline here and there. This really annoyed me, because the subplots were a waste of time. If the story had stayed focused, this movie would have been excellent. Tom Hardy was the only piece that kept me into the movie. His performance was phenomenal. He was so good, you almost forget about the mess of a movie you just watched. If it wasn't for that confused and empty feeling I felt when I left the theater, I might have applauded this movie, but unfortunately Hardy wasn't enough to make this movie great.

This movie should have been way better than it was. It has thrills, but all in the wrong place and for the wrong purpose. The lack of focus may have you annoyed, but Hardy will definitely relieve some of that (he is really excellent). I can't say I would recommend spending any money on this. This is one of those movies that is cool to watch when it comes on cable, or purchased from Red Box. It's worth seeing, but not really worth paying movie ticket price for...C+