I didn’t think it was possible to over-cliché a cliché. Well, that’s not true, I guess. Jersey Shore over-clichés The Real World which clichés the modern American teenager. The X-Factor over-clichés American Idol which clichés the new American dream/“get-famous-quick scheme.” And Male Professional Figure Skating over-clichés International Soccer which clichés vast assortments of gay men crying alone in wide open spaces about the possibility that they just broke a nail and, therefore, life just isn’t worth living anymore.
But hey! Here’s Brothers which tries to color a beautifully elaborate picture of love and family and friendship and salvation and the dangers of PTSD except it’s only given a basic 8-pack of Crayola crayons to do it. So, not only is it cliché, but it’s bright and pure and in-your-fucking-face-and-who-the-fuck-uses-yellow-green-anyway cliché mixed into a giant color-by-numbers designed for a hell of a lot more shades of depth than this movie was willing to give it. It’s not just that the main marine character has PTSD from a horrible experience overseas; it’s that he’s SO distant that he practically forgets everyone’s names and I’m amazed he even remembers how to pee. It’s not just that marine’s brother and marine’s wife start developing a connection for each other; it’s that disillusioned marine thinks they are having sex and nothing but sex and nobody is willing to flat out say they’re not having sex ‘til even the kids start saying they’re having sex to the point where I don’t even think the movie knew if they were having sex (spoiler: they weren’t having sex…I think).
Well, if you’re going to commit to the basics: infidelity, returned distraught marine, family betrayal, you might as well go all out from the get-go. No need to really develop anything from the ground floor just blow your load and deal with the foreplay while the audience is smoking a cigarette and just hope they notice. Sigh, the stories lately have just really been missing lately. Obviously missing and that was really my biggest struggle with Brothers; it committed to the clichés so much but didn’t really know what do to with the over-arching story and it just made everything seem forced and uncomfortable; things didn’t flow very well.
If you haven’t figured it out, Brothers is about a man who joins the marines, has a shitty experience in them (POW), and comes back to find his wife and his brother have gotten incredibly close because they all assumed he was dead. Unsure what to do or think, the distant marine starts coming up with assumptions and accusations and even expresses those concerns with his bro with the whole “Is this what you’ve been doing while I’m away” while his idiot brother turns to him and instead of saying “no” says something as classy as “It depends on what your definition of ‘is’ is” and then walks away. Didn’t these people learn anything from DARE? Just say no.
Despite the struggle with story and the, once again “convenience of inconvenience” rearing its ugly head, Brothers was relatively decent. I knew what it was trying to do, I could see the outline and picture it in my head but it turned out drastically different because it just stayed a bit to pure with its stereotypes. It had plenty of sweet moments and did leave me trying to put myself in the character’s shoes trying to figure out what I would do if I were them (other than saying “No.”). It’s overdone-ness in certain areas made it a really powerful movie at times, but it’s like Nascar in that you can pretty much ignore it as a whole and wait for the highlights.
Still worth the watch, though really missed completely on story, which affected everything else drastically, I generously give Brothers a 7 dustbusters out of 10, mostly because I love Jim Sheridan still, I could tell what he was trying to do, and I don’t in any way regret owning this movie.
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