A Sheriff's Deputy in a small rural town is tasked with guarding a crime scene, and the dead body lying in the middle of it. But when the Deputy somehow manages to lose said body, he inadvertently uncovers a criminal conspiracy as he attempts to get it back.
Much like it's central character, The Deputy - which is based on the book by Victor Gischler - can be a bit slow and meandering, as we follow Deputy Toby (Duke Nicholson) on his roundabout journey to find the body that has inexplicably wandered off from the crime scene he was charged with guarding. Yet it also makes for somewhat compelling viewing as our plodding hero eventually discovers there is something ugly going on in this little town. Slowly, that odd pace begins to make sense. Afterall, this is Toby's journey, and all throughout we are with him as he goes about - in his own unique way - trying to figure out what is going on.
Nicholson is the perfect embodiment of 'failure to launch' as he emerges from the trailer he calls home to head into work. His badge and gun clinging to the ripped t-shirt and pyjamas he hasn't bothered to change out of. Some might say Toby's indicative of the younger generation's work ethic. There are certainly times when you want to slap him. Or at least question the training he has received. But if that is the case, and he really is reflective of the lazy youth, Nicholson also brings to the struggling deputy their ability to surprise us old folk. Mostly through a dogged determination you'd be forgiven for thinking he didn't have.
Many of us have experienced turning points in our lives, and this rather hellish night is definitely Toby's. You could say a fire is lit underneath him. Or a part of him, anyway. It's interesting to see the lad essentially wake up over the course of the night. By no means an easy ride, but director Matt Sukkar and writer Carlo Bernard (creator of Narcos) do make it a believable one. They avoid Hollywood cliché and keep things fairly grounded with a criminal conspiracy that you wouldn’t be surprised to see uncovered on the news. It’s not something we haven’t seen before, and the twists are fairly foreseeable. But it is a believable scenario, and the real fun obviously comes from watching a certain deputy’s attempts to get to the bottom of it all.
As Toby bumbles his way through a rather unorthodox investigation, he gets into more than a scrape or two, and while some of those scenes suffer from some clunky editing, they are at least in keeping with the rest of the movie; gritty and rather messy. There’s no glamour to be found, and rather refreshingly, Toby makes more than a few mistakes - the kind you’d expect of a rookie left to their own devices. Luckily for him, his colleagues (William H. Macy, Tiffany Haddish, Stephen Dorf) occasionally show up to yell at him when he gets things wrong. The three co-stars are all very good, but their small roles suggest they're presence has a little more to with their star power than it probably should. That said, it's the moments when they're yelling at Toby that he is at his most relatable, because we've all been there.
An oddly compelling crime drama, in which chaos and criminality come to a small town. The Deputy can be a little predictable and meandering, as well as annoyingly believable. It's the type of movie that may occasionally inspire you to yell at your screen. But the mystery at its heart is certainly intriguing. And by the end, you might even find yourself rooting for Deputy Toby... in spite of his ineptitude.
6/10
What did you think of The Deputy? Leave a comment below or find us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Threads. You can also email us at moviemoustache@gmail.com.
Comments
Post a Comment