It sounded easy. Take a film weeks before its blockbuster Christmas release, and reshoot the twenty-two scenes of Kevin Spacey, substituting Christopher Plummer as Grandpa Getty. This meant an overhaul of not only getting the actors to return to the set, and later reediting many scenes, but changing the marketing campaign. Every day-on-the-set in-between would make the movie 10 million dollars over budget. Gulp. But Ridley Scott pulls it off without one flaw.
The irony is that the urgency of making the film sounds as great as the kidnapping.
In 1973, kidnappers demanded $17 million from billionaire J. Paul Getty (Plummer) in exchange for his grandson Paul/Paolo (Charlie Plummer’s) release. [Charlie is no relation to Christopher Plummer in real life. ] Paul/Paolo is wandering the summer, sultry streets of Rome when he’s kidnapped. But despite all the money in the world, Getty refuses to pay a single penny. His daughter-in-law, Gail (Michelle Williams) is horrified and desperate. She hasn’t a pot-to-piss-in, as they say, so her father-in-law’s reluctance and game-play could mean death for her son.
Whatever a person most identifies with (in this case it’s money) becomes the thing the person is most going to protect. When everyone wants a piece of what you worked so hard to build, it becomes a game to rid yourself of the leeches. Add in some psychological nonsense from a billionaires childhood-gone-wrong, and you have a villain on your hands. A Master at his own game…albeit one performance by Plummer of craft, charm and demon.
The marketing spin on this film is what is the most interesting twist of all. Whether we cared about some stingy rich grandfather’s wrong-doings was one thing. But add in the ‘Can Plummer replace Spacey?’ issue, and you’ve got a curiosity factor on your hands. Like that of folks slowing down on the highway to see who’s been in the accident on the other side of the medium.
The what-makes-Getty-tick is an interesting study. To be a Getty is “an extraordinary thing.” He isn’t just the richest man in the world but the richest man in history. It all began – as we learn – when he brought the oil of the Saudi dessert to the states. Thus, Getty oil. But what we don’t learn is the history of his distant and strained relationship with his children.
His daughter-in-law insists to her Getty husband, John Paul Getty (Andrew Buchan) that he must reach out to his father (he can’t pay the mortgage.) When the son (of Paul/Paolo) writes a “Dear Father…”letter, his prayers are answered. The estranged father summons his son, informing him he’s going to have him run his company. This ultimately turns into a disaster when the son gets all Euro-trash on his wife (sex, drugs, rock & roll and hookers.) But Gail has her grace and dignity intact, refusing to take any Getty money. She only wants her children.
Until…
The kidnapping of her son, Paul/Paolo. But did she plant the kidnapping? Did the grandfather? And, in order to get custody of the grandkids? Perhaps Fletcher Chase (Mark Wahlberg) a former CIA operative and now Getty fixer… knows the answers.
We get the message loud and clear that Grandpa Getty will trip over a dime to get to a penny. And we get the message everything in life has a price, but just what is that price?
While beautifully shot in Rome and other locations, including England’s countryside, there isn’t a sense of initial urgency . It’s only later-on – during a disturbing ‘ear’ scene that we begin to really care, and twist in our seats. Instead the film often feels lateral. Sure it’s got some witty lines in a screenplay by David Scarpa, and based on the book Painfully Rich but again urgency is not a word for a family whose bank account boasts ‘choice.’
With no one to clearly latch onto in this vanilla-moving-film-of-espionage, we turn to Gail as our hero. It’s not about her confronting the would-be-killers, but instead about her confronting the biggest criminal of all…her father-in-law. 2.5 tiaras