Made
Bobby's buddy Ricky (for this is a buddy movie) is the
irritating type, as we are constantly reminded. He’s not quite in the “do you
want to hear the most annoying sound in the world?” mould of Dumb and Dumber, because this buddy
movie is much more grounded in realism than that. However, he approaches that
level and, when you think about it, to do so in a realistic way is pretty
impressive. The scene with the first-class cabin crew is a case in point of
just how toe-curling Ricky’s antics can be. It’s established early on that
Ricky does things his way, usually the wrong way, and eventually there is an uneasy pleasure to be had
anticipating just how he will disappoint Bobby at each juncture.
So far, so good. Even if the routine of the
annoying but perhaps ultimately dependable buddy and his long-suffering foil
has been done many times before, this time it’s done very well. Bobby and Ricky
are well-cast and we’re convinced. The milieu and the language differentiate
this from the typical. For example, Bobby doesn’t want to be ‘made’ necessarily, he just wants to earn enough money so that his lapdancing
girlfriend “doesn’t have to grind her ass into men’s erections to pay her rent”.
Vince perhaps would like to be a bigshot in a VIP nightclub bar but, despite
splashing the cash, he ultimately fails to "even get a handjob from the bridge
and tunnel club”. It’s tempting to say that it's all very American in its mores (the American flag literally provides
the backdrop for the opening scene) and we’re familiar with this milieu now from
the Sopranos, the Wire etc. etc. Made (in
The relentlessly
aspirational quick-fixing palm-greasing, to get a better table in a restaurant
or a better hotel suite, may not be your kind of thing. However, it’s telling that Bobby isn’t
into that kind of thing at the end of the day. We should give Jon Favreau, the
writer and director, who plays Bobby, credit for creating a script that’s
subtler and more well-observed than a simple piss-take
of the Rickys of the world. Here the characters have depth and history, the
behind-the-scenes feel of the gangster story is fairly plausible with some nice
details, and the screenplay enables Bobby to finally fight his way
out of a corner and earn his dues. See the straight man standing up in a
crooked world.