Savages

Directed by Oliver Stone

(R)

Oliver Stone’s latest finds the veteran director returning to frenetic, high-octane mode, said Richard Corliss in Time. After “suppressing his more lurid instincts” in such recent fare as his Wall Street sequel, Stone summons here “the craftily addled mania” he flaunted in Platoon and Natural Born Killers. Taylor Kitsch and Aaron Johnson play wealthy California marijuana growers who go to war with a Mexican cartel when their shared girlfriend (Blake Lively) is kidnapped. Johnson proves impressive, but the supporting cast shines brighter, said Bill Goodykoontz in The Arizona Republic. John Travolta is suitably weaselly as a corrupt Fed, Salma Hayek makes a “convincingly menacing” drug lord, and Benicio Del Toro practically steals the show as the cartel’s brutal enforcer. The movie never becomes more than “a juvenile fantasy of bullets, breasts, and bongs,” said Rafer Guzmán in Newsday. Which would be okay if Stone didn’t keep hinting at profundity to come. He instead tacks on a cop-out ending and provides no serious comment on Mexico’s drug war. “Ultimately, Savages is the rare Stone film with absolutely nothing to say.”

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