What a waste of my time!!!

Purely Joyful Movie!

Overrated

Great movie. Not sure what people expected but I found it highly entertaining.

Al Klein (Christopher Meloni) owns an used car lot. Ash Martini (Dean Norris) is his second-in-command, Barlow (Amaury Nolasco) is the mechanic, and Gail (Ashley Jensen) is the new secretary with many excuses to go home early. Al misses his son Freddy (Devon Bostick)'s graduation but his ex-wife Barbara (Bridget Moynahan) and Chick (Xander Berkeley) don't know it. Freddy decides to forget about college and join him as a car salesman.Writer/director Joel Surnow has made a couple of successful TV shows but none of his successes are in comedies. This is not going to break that streak. There are some fun sales techniques. The family drama is anchored by some good actors but it doesn't work. In the end, this struggles to gain any traction.

In the opening scene of 2014's Small Time, Christopher Meloni's character (Al Klein) and the Dean Norris character (Ash Martini), blackmail a smart aleck teenager into buying a rundown BMW. What an interesting sales technique. And what a hokey, dumb, and conventional farce this flick turned out to be. Note to Meloni: You were so brilliant on Law & Order: Special Victims Unit. Why would you retire from that show to somehow find your way into a something like this? And note to Bridget Moynahan: Are you that desperate in Hollywood that you would subject yourself to playing a clichéd, lonely divorcée via the felonious downgrade that is Small Time? These are some of the questions I pondered while viewing what I like to think of as a sleazy, used car salesmen character study putting first time director Joel Sumow completely in over his head. Granted, there have been a lot of bad movies to come out this year. Small Time just managed to crack my top five.Released in the U.S. in April and having its only DVD premiere in the country of Sweden (how random is that), this misguided, coming of age dreck veers toward TV sitcom territory. What's on screen gives used car salesmen a bad name as it chronicles the father/son relationship between Al Klein (Meloni) and 18 year-old high school graduate, Freddy Klein (Devon Bostick, who appears as a deadpan Jimmy Fallon look-alike here). Al, along with his douchbag assistant (Norris), sell cars by way of being a deceptive jack-ass. His boy, fresh out of high school, decides to forgo his mother's aspirations of college and work in his father's low key operation (the film also sites his lack for wanting to be in a fraternity as a reason for this decision). Freddy reluctantly resents his mother's current husband (Xander Berkeley as Chick) and wants to succeed in the real world as opposed to getting a false education (as he puts it). He then moves in with his father putting a strain on the ex- husband/ex-wife relationship (all the while creating a cocky air in his personality forcing said dad to fire him). Bostick's character has ways of making more money for his father, is high on selling cars, but has an attitude with the customers and believes that quote unquote, "people are shite". That puts Al in a precarious position. He eventually buys into the idea of Freddy instead living the life of a college student by hoping he'll eventually attend any California school (within the Southern region). To say that this film is manipulated by its paint-by- numbers script is an understatement. I wanted to slap the actors across the face and tell them to wait for a better project later on in the year.Fubar plot and rote characters aside, the thing that I wondered most about Small Time is this: When the heck does this movie takes place? Throughout its running time, the audience deals with a 1970's musical soundtrack along with every character dressing like they're living in the 90's (that goes for the hairstyles as well). And the automobiles on the used car lot channel a mix of different decades (I think I saw a 1989 Cavalier). But hey, at least the phone concept is consistent (everyone talks on a pay phone and/or landline, not a cell phone). In truth, this is just another stupid independent film (there are so many of them) that tries to be cool, tries to be cute, but just completely flaps in the wind. It's not the actors/actresses that's the problem, just the concept. Hypocrisy is a dainty word (what with the Meloni character telling his son it's okay to force a customer into buying a crap car only to state that his methods are not appropriate). Too bad this thing seems to hammer that notion to levels of utmost absurdity.All in all, Small Time is undoubtedly a movie with a "small" brain. Here's hoping the people in Sweden felt the exact same way when it ventured into their neck of the woods.Of note: With Small Time, look for one of the most undeveloped roles in screen history. Garcelle Beauvais plays Meloni's character's girlfriend and it's thankless beyond comprehension. I felt sorry for her in threefold fashion. Oh, and just for the record, the director of this formulaic romp was the producer of the hit series, 24. I'm surprised that he didn't feel compelled to forcefully remove his name from this project.

It's hard to admit I was somewhat charmed by this indie, when one of the main themes takes place on a used car lot where fast talking salesmen will use every trick-in-the-book to sell you a car. Of course, there's much more to the movie than that, with family dramas and a coming-of-age tale being also a big part of the scenario. To me, it was mostly presented in a laid-back humorous way which appealed to me.Chris Meloni and Dean Norris are excellent in their starring roles as Al and Ash respectively. They've been partners in Diamond Motors, a used car lot in Covina, California, for the past 16 years.When Al's son Freddy, portrayed by Devon Bostick, is having his high school graduation ceremony, both Al and Ash attend. There they meet up with Freddy's mother Barb, ably played by the talented and beautiful Bridget Moynahan, who's been divorced from Al for 14 years, and re-married now to the rather obnoxious but very wealthy Chick (Xander Berkeley).Shortly after his graduation, Freddy tells Al he doesn't want to go to college (Cal Poly), but instead wants to work at Al's car business to gain life experience and even wants to live with his father. This will set off a series of events and consequences which will result in some valuable life's lessons being learned by all.All in all, I felt this indie sometimes lost its' way, such as very crass scenes of Al and Ash's buddies getting together for lunches, which although realistic seemed out of context to the rest of the film. Aside from that though, the movie, written and directed by Joel Surnow had enough humor and drama to keep me engaged throughout.

When you watch a movie, often times you build positive and negative off of expectations. If you go to see this movie, enjoy it for what it is.'Small Time' is a relaxing movie that surprised me. Al Klein (Christopher Meloni), used car salesman, allows his son, Freddy (Devon Bostick) to work on his lot selling cars rather than go to college. Freddy is a natural, but is it what he should be doing with his life?This is a story about closure, but the problem with talking about closure is, it would be just spoilers.In life, we have to make choices and of course live with those choices; but some times it is hard, even 10 years later to accept what seemed like the best thing to do. We often lived trapped by those decisions, unable to move on.Director and writer Joel Surnow, who has worked in television prolifically, used a succinct and condensed writing style that is often lost in movies. In cinema everything is drawn out, rushed, then drawn out between scenes of random events to show the director's 'artistic' capability.Just about everything said in 'Small Time' had a point and added to the story; this story, each character had depth, history, feelings. Or, in the other words, 'The writing and the dialogue was good and I liked it' (and as a writer myself, I tend to hate more than I like).There was psychology to these characters, thoughts in their heads. I was genuinely impressed. I could talk about the acting, but I felt the three main roles played by Meloni, Norris (breaking bad fame), and Bostick (older brother from Diary of a wimpy kid) were done professionally. Three capable actors, what else would you expect? Now, some people might not find enough drama in this film to enjoy it. We are so conditioned to seeing murders and affairs and fights and violence in dramas, we don't know what to do without it. All I can say is, as a person who values his time, I did not feel robbed by this movie and I could appreciate the story and the characters.