The Instigators

The only juice it has are the landmarks and accurate Boston stuff. Really unlikeable characters for an simple action movie. There is a palpable lethargy to the whole thing which I guess you could say is because Damon character is suicidal but everyone is asleep and the banter is only barely servicable.

The Instigators has a decent premise, and an outstanding cast. Damon and Affleck have fantastic chemistry together, and there is no end to the amount of brilliant character actors. Unfortunately the screenplay is far too often content with settling for being a dad movie. Sure there's a lot of snappy dialogue, but the movie often thinks it's being funnier than it actually is. As a result the film ends up in this weird middle ground where it's not funny or dramatic enough to be more than ok.

Funandfunny+Mightbethehottestsheslooked

Affleck and Damon are cool together, some comic bits actually work despite so lazily written, but Liman -- neither a terrible nor a good director -- just can't elevate such a mid material. You could expect he would at least land some juicy heist action set pieces out of this, but no, we've got nothing. Also, what a bizarre waste of a fantastic cast we have here -- how come you have dudes like Stuhlbarg and PWH and relegate them to a couple of shitty scenes?

(OCEAN'S 2)

Funny with a stacked cast but it took itself too seriously to have characters doing completely illogical things all the time and absolutely unrealistic car chase scenes. Passable for a straight to streaming movie.

Marching to its own drumbeat, and with some wicked fun dialogue bandied about, it's a sometimes dumb but always engaging action comedy.

too much swear

"The Instigators" is an offbeat buddy heist movie packed with eccentric characters. I appreciated the deliberate absence of emotion in its most stressful scenes, which unexpectedly enhanced its appeal. Although it was over the top, and they spent considerable time justifying this approach in the story, I enjoyed it.

Entertaining because of Affleck and Damon, but what a letdown. It just sorta plods along, even though the whole situation is deserving of something more exciting and clever. Some of the dialogue is snappy but it's not especially funny.