At the time of writing this review, I watched Amsterdam five months and a day ago on a plane to Hawaii… and I am struggling to remember what the movie was about. After looking over my notes, I can clearly remember what I thought of Amsterdam but cannot remember what the story of the film was. And I think this might be a criticism of the movie itself but I'll get into that later. So for now you get the synopsis from IMDb: "In the 1930s, three friends witness a murder, are framed for it, and uncover one of the most outrageous plots in American history." Now time for the review.

So I mentioned that I could not remember what Amsterdam was about. And I think this is because I was confused for the majority of watching the movie. I found the movie to be very strange and difficult to understand. I made a note that I couldn't figure out what the movie was about in the earlier stages of the film. Amsterdam did make more sense as the movie progressed (like a lot of movies) but I still remained quite confused and the earlier parts of the movie did not make any more sense. I cannot think back to the opening lines of the movie and whether this movie was based on a true story (or partially based on a true story or inspired by real events or inspired by events that could have happened or any other fancy way of saying that this thing is not entirely a fairytale). But I would think it would have to be to be this strange and confusing.

A lot happened in the opening ten minutes of Amsterdam. In these ten minutes, it felt like we were running out of time and the creators needed to convey all this information to the audience. However, it did feel like a constant movie with minimal cuts to make the film feel as realistic as possible. I do generally like these sorts of movies and think this probably played in the movie's favour but these ten minutes still felt very rushed.

Amsterdam has some great actors and this produces some great acting as you would expect. All the actors created unique and memorable characters. This movie was somewhat funny, however, this was a result of the execution from the actors and not because of the writing. From memory, I found many of the jokes to be cheap but the actors' delivery gave me a little chuckle.

I find this to be the best summary for the film overall: bad story, good execution. The execution wasn't good enough for me to enjoy the movie and obviously not good enough for me to remember it, but it was enough to make it bearable. You would hope this would be the case with the stellar lineup of actors (Christian Bale, Margot Robbie, John David Washington, Anya Taylor-Joy, Chris Rock, Michael Shannon, Mike Myers, Timothy Olyphant, Rami Malek, Robert De Niro, even Taylor Swift made an appearance!) and the large amount of money that likely went into the film.

So I managed to remember enough to write a review on Amsterdam. All in all, it passed the time for a portion of the flight. It had a very strange story but the execution was enough to stop me from choosing another movie from the catalogue that the airline provided (although on reflection, I maybe should have chosen Jurassic Park). If you're a fan of any of the many actors that Amsterdam offers, I may suggest checking out the movie to see said actor's portrayal of an iconic character. Otherwise, watch Jurassic Park.

Note to self: Don't wait five months to write a review of a movie.

Director: David O. Russell

Starring: Christian Bale, Margot Robbie, John David Washington

Year released: 2022

Review by Tristan Carr

Last edited: 13/08/2023