‘Good Liar’ pairs Mirren, McKellen

A modest middlebrow thriller

FBy Jake Coyle

or a blind date, we could hardly do better than Helen Mirren and Ian McKellen. They are brought swiftly together by a computer dating service in the opening minutes of “The Good Liar”. Both click “widowed”. When they cautiously sit down in a quiet London restaurant, and Mirren begins sipping a drink, it’s hard not think they’re a match made in heaven.

And yet “The Good Liar”, a modest middlebrow thriller, never lives up to the sheer pleasure of seeing its two leads together, for the first time as costars. Directed by Bill Condon (“Kinsey”, “Beauty and the Beast”, “Dreamgirls”) and adapted from Nicholas Searle’s 2016 novel, “The Good Liar” has the polish that you would expect from all involved, but little of the sparkle.

Immediately, there’s a play between truth and deceit. When Roy Courtnay (McKellen) is filling out his dating profile, he selects “non-smoker” while a cigarette smolders nearby. Right after their meeting, Roy – once out of eyeshot from Mirren’s Betty McLeish – quickly sheds his kindly old gentleman persona and skips into a nightclub to hash out a scheme with his co-conspirators.

What unfolds goes considerably further than the small exaggerations and distortions commonly found on Tinder pages. “The Good Liar” delves into deeper falsehoods of identity and history, teasing out a twisty narrative that winds its way back to World War II. It aspires to the psychological intrigue of Patricia Highsmith or John Le Carre without ever summoning such a thick air of mystery and danger.

Roy is a conman. He’s got a few hustles going on, but his focus is drawn increasingly to getting close to Betty and robbing her of her small fortune, one amassed from a career as a history professor at Oxford. She lives outside London, and Roy’s quick insertion into her life (he feigns a bad limp to score a bed in her guest room) raises the suspicions of Betty’s grandson, Steven (Russell Tovey).

It would give too much away to discuss the film’s big reveal, but there also isn’t a great deal worth discussing aside from that. For one, we can see a major turn coming all along in the script by Jeffrey Hatcher (who previously teamed with Condon and McKellen for “Mr Holmes”). Mirren is far too cunning an actress to simply play a suckered old lady in the suburbs. We know it’s just a matter of time until her intelligence and ferocity reveal itself.

Talents

In the meantime, there are a few things to chew on, mainly the stirring score by the great Carter Burwell (“Carol”, “No Country for Old Men”) and the undeniable talents of Mirren and McKellen, who stitch the film together through subtle, skillful glances and gestures. They’re artists at play, clearly enjoying each other’s company.

“The Good Liar” is a kind of film one wants to love. Such old-fashioned genre movies, let alone those starring actors in their 70s and 80s, are hard to find these days. But in trying to take a simple crime set-up and stretch it into a more sweeping tale of vengeance and victimhood, “The Good Liar” has to make some fairly preposterous moves to get there, and it doesn’t do a very good job of cloaking them.

If you’re in the mood for a Hitchcockian thriller rooted in the crimes of Nazi Germany, hunt instead for Christian Petzold’s underseen “Phoenix”. Now that film will flatten you.

“The Good Liar”, a Warner Bros release, is rated R by the Motion Picture Association of America for some strong violence, and for language and

LOS ANGELES:

Ryan Destiny, who’s best known for her role in Fox’s “Star”, will play Claressa “T-Rex” Shields in Universal’s biopic “Flint Strong”.

The film marks Destiny’s first starring role in a major studio movie after her breakout role in the Lee Daniels series.

Based on Zackary Canepari brief nudity. Running time: 110 minutes. Two and a half stars out of four.

LOS ANGELES:

is in final talks to co-star with in “Uncharted”, Sony’s upcoming adaptation of the hit video game.

(“Bumblebee”) is directing the movie that follows Nathan Drake, a treasure hunter who journeys across the world to uncover various historical mysteries. Wahlberg will portray Victor “Sully” Sullivan, an American treasure hunter, fortune seeker and businessman, as well as a friend, mentor and father figure to Drake. Holland is set to play Drake.

Ironically, Wahlberg was originally on board to play Drake years ago when was first directing an adaptation. With Sony transforming the project into an origin story, Wahlberg wanted to return to the movie in some capacity.

is penning the script with the team of Art Marcum and

The gaming series, which began in 2007 with “Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune”, was created by developer Naughty Dog and published by PlayStation. It has sold more than 41 million copies to date.

and are producing the film through Atlas Entertainment, as well as Avi Arad and Ari Arad through Arad Productions. Sony’s PlayStation Productions – headed by

and – will also have a hand in producing. Qizilbash and Swan will serve as executive producers on “Uncharted”, the first true partnership between PlayStation Productions and Sony Pictures.

“Uncharted” continues a busy year for Wahlberg, who stars next in Netflix’s thriller “Wonderland” and A24’s family drama “Good Joe Bell”. He is currently in production on Paramount’s fantasy movie “Infinite”. (Agencies) and Drea Cooper’s 2015 boxing documentary “T-Rex”, the story follows 17-year-old Shields, a Flint, Mich, native whose dreams of becoming the first woman in history to win an Olympic gold medal in boxing are realized at the 2012 Summer Olympics in London. The studio acquired Shields’ life rights and rights to the documentary in

Also:

2016.

Rachel Morrison will direct the movie, marking her feature film directorial debut. Morrison, who made history as the first female cinematographer to be nominated for an Academy Award for “Mudbound”, also served as the director of photography for “Black Panther”. (RTRS)