{"id":230541,"date":"2025-09-16T05:08:08","date_gmt":"2025-09-16T05:08:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/230541\/"},"modified":"2025-09-16T05:08:08","modified_gmt":"2025-09-16T05:08:08","slug":"bob-odenkirk-in-ben-wheatleys-violent-dark-comedy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/230541\/","title":{"rendered":"Bob Odenkirk in Ben Wheatley’s Violent Dark Comedy"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tIf there was any lingering doubt regarding Bob Odenkirk<\/a>\u2018s late-career reinvention as a legit everyman action star, Normal handily seals the deal. Having proved himself up to the task after Nobody<\/a> and Nobody 2<\/a>, he wildly ups the ante with an unapologetically over-the-top small-town crime thriller.<\/p>\n

\n\tDirected by genre-hopping Ben Wheatley<\/a> and written by John Wick creator Derek Kolstad from a story hatched by Kolstad and Odenkirk, the subversive Western is a take-no-prisoners gore fest that peppers all the visceral carnage with an equal sprinkling of dry wit. Given that it shares so much of its DNA with those Nobody movies (also penned by Kolstad), it would be understandable if some might think it\u2019s actually Nobody 3, which wouldn\u2019t necessarily work against it. Given the energetic reception that greeted the movie\u2019s world premiere as part of TIFF<\/a>\u2018s genre-heavy Midnight Madness section, the indie production should be able to corral U.S. distribution with little difficulty. Amazon MGM Studios has the film for Canada.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tNormal\t\t<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t\t\tThe Bottom Line<\/p>\n

\tA bone-crunching good time.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\tVenue:<\/strong> Toronto International Film Festival (Midnight Madness)
Cast:<\/strong> Bob Odenkirk, Henry Winkler, Lena Headey
Director:<\/strong> Ben Wheatley
Screenwriter:<\/strong> Derek Kolstad
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tRated R,
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t1 hour 30 minutes\n\t\t<\/p>\n

\n\tAs a recent arrival to the quaint town of Normal, Minnesota (population 1890, at least before the bloodbath begins), Odenkirk\u2019s Sheriff Ulysses is more than okay with his temporary placement in the half-abandoned municipality, especially since he seems to be escaping some trauma from his recent past. \u201cMy goal is to leave this town just the way I found it,\u201d he maintains, as he leaves yet another unanswered phone message for his estranged wife.<\/p>\n

\n\tBut that proves more easily said than done when Ulysses starts to notice a few cracks in Normal\u2019s genteel exterior. Maybe it\u2019s that overabundance of firearms on display in all the local establishments, or the suspicious death of his predecessor, Sheriff Gunderson, or the town\u2019s oddball Mayor Kibner (Henry Winkler<\/a>). Or maybe it\u2019s that spirit animal of a mysterious mammoth moose that keeps popping up.<\/p>\n

\n\tThose suspicions are confirmed when, responding to a botched bank heist in progress, Ulysses discovers everybody\u2019s keen on shooting the sheriff, including his two deputies (Ryan Allen and Billy McLellan).<\/p>\n

\n\tLeft with no one to ally himself with except the two failed robbers (Rena Jolly and Brendan Fletcher), Ulysses opts to fight back, whining, \u201cI\u2019m tired of running away from every goddamn thing!\u201d In the middle of unleashing an insane amount of violence, they make the discovery that the bank vault is hiding a substantial stash of gold bars belonging to the incoming Japanese Yakuza, which had been using Normal to hide a portion of their illicit profits in return for a percentage divided among the struggling townspeople. What starts out as a geographic and comedically thematic companion piece to the Coen Brothers\u2019 Fargo decisively shifts gears into Tarantino-worthy grindhouse excess and never looks back. There\u2019s an inventive, Rube Goldberg precision to the barrage of violence that keeps things involving, especially when the Yakuza arrives on the scene.<\/p>\n

\n\tHandling it all with a detached, shrugging sense of doom, Odenkirk proves the right man for the job at hand in both of the film\u2019s two tonally separate halves, and he\u2019s supported by a colorful cast including Lena Headey<\/a> as the town\u2019s enigmatic barkeep and McLellan as one of those two deputies, whose squeaky stiff leather jacket keeps announcing his arrival.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe wintry Winnipeg, Manitoba, backdrops provide some stark contrast for all the spilled bits of red, effectively captured by cinematographer Armando Salas (Ozark) in hues of blue and amber, while British director Wheatley marks a welcome return to his earlier works \u2014 in particular 2016\u2019s Free Fire<\/a>, which took home TIFF\u2019s Midnight Madness People\u2019s Choice Award that year.<\/p>\n

\n\tEven though Wheatley\u2019s previous film was the considerably less enthusiastically received sequel Meg 2: The Trench<\/a>, one can\u2019t help wondering what tantalizing possibilities a Meg vs. Ulysses match-up might hold.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"If there was any lingering doubt regarding Bob Odenkirk\u2018s late-career reinvention as a legit everyman action star, Normal…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":230542,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[124333,83016,171,1694,124334,64287,111058,111060,77123,85256,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-230541","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-entertainment","8":"tag-ben-wheatley","9":"tag-bob-odenkirk","10":"tag-entertainment","11":"tag-henry-winkler","12":"tag-lena-headey","13":"tag-tiff","14":"tag-tiff-2025","15":"tag-toronto-2025","16":"tag-toronto-film-festival","17":"tag-toronto-international-film-festival","18":"tag-united-states","19":"tag-unitedstates","20":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115212248971486922","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/230541","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=230541"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/230541\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/230542"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=230541"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=230541"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=230541"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}