Hey, everyone. “Moriarty” here.

Before I get down to the pleasure of reading this 160-something page script sitting on my desktop right now, I’m going to share an early look at a film that snuck up on me a few days ago, one that grows on me the more I think about it. Moving to the Valley has had some interesting advantages. I live right around the corner from a theater where they do a ton of test screenings and hand out passes for other screenings in other places, and as a result, using my long-since-retired hypnotic stare of suggestion, I’ve been able to infiltrate a few early screenings again recently, just for old time’s sake.

For example, I was at the test recently for Rian Johnson’s second film. I know Quint liked it quite a bit when he saw it recently, but I also know some thing have been done to it since, and I was far less familiar with the project than Quint in general. I read an early draft of the script, but it was so long ago that walking into the theater, I didn’t remember anything much from it.

As far as Rian Johnson goes, when BRICK came out, I was quite fond of it. Didn’t make my end-of-the-year list for 2006, but I thought it was a promising start for a new filmmaker, and worth paying attention to. Now, with THE BROTHERS BLOOM, Johnson’s ready to step up to the mainstream as a filmmaker, and that promising start has given way to great accomplishment. What’s exciting is seeing how his second film shows a sort of expansive growth instead of a retreat into a particular style. There are a number of filmmakers working these days, some of whom I like quite a bit, who have a single style in which they shoot every story. I think there’s a hint of fear in that, a sense that they need to stick to what they’ve done before. BRICK was a very stylized film, very particular, and I think part of me was anticipating that THE BROTHERS BLOOM would look the same, sound the same, feel the same. I think I was anticipating what Rian Johnson’s style was, which is sort of unfair. Instead, now that I’ve seen it, I’m pleased to see that you can’t pin him down to one thing yet.

This is definitely stylized, a particular reality that he’s establishing early on, but it’s very different from BRICK. It’s appropriate to the story, to the characters, to the story that Johnson’s telling. Instead of trying to put himself and his identity front and center, THE BROTHERS BLOOM feels to me like a story told by a teller who is pleased with the story itself, eager to see it punch your buttons. In fact, it feels a lot like a story told by Stephen (Mark Ruffalo), Johnson’s idea of a con man superhero and the architect of this dizzy, sweet-natured liar’s fairy tale.

Stephen is, of course, only half the equation. His brother Bloom (Adrien Brody) exerts an equal gravity over the way this particular con unfolds, although the question hovers over every scene: is Bloom in on the con, or is he the ultimate mark? The relationship between Ruffalo and Brody is dynamic and warm and funny, and it’s one of my favorite brother acts in a while. I buy it. I buy that these guys grew up together and speak a secret language and that they love each other and hate each other in equal measure, and that they are constantly at war with one another, and back-to-back against the world at the same time. They capture all of that in their interplay, something that seems crucial if you’re going to use the word BROTHERS in the title.

The way the film starts, with Ricky Jay narrating like the con man’s Dr. Seuss, it’s very sweet, very gentle. Stephen and Bloom were shuttled around the foster care system as kids, only able to depend on each other, already insular in their style. Stephen developed his con skills as a defense mechanism to not only keep them both alive and feed them and provide for them, but also as a way of rewriting the world around Bloom. Bloom, on the other hand, grew a conscience, since it was obvious Stephen couldn’t. And that difference between them, the division of the head and the heart, is what defines them. It’s what defines the film, what drives all the drama between them.

Ruffalo looks like he relishes the role of Stephen, who puts the “artist” in con artist, creating these narratives in which the people being conned are given the illusion of choice even as they’re led right to the conclusion that Stephen has designed. His best moments in the film are when he’s watching people react to his cons, enjoying the way things play out.

Brody plays tortured really well, especially when he gets to play it as a joke, the way he does here. Bloom is the heartsick romantic because that’s the role he’s always played, but the real fun comes when he meets Penelope (Rachel Weisz), an eccentric millionaire mark, the target of Stephen’s latest sting, and Bloom recognizes in her something familiar, an aptitude, a skill set that would make her just like him, malleable, and considering how much he claims to hate his lifestyle, recognizing that in her complicates his feelings tremendously. I don’t think Weisz has ever had a role like this before, playful and silly and sweet, a screwball comedy heroine set adrift from the rules of screwball comedy, plush and sexy but also very innocent. She and Brody both manage to play a childlike purity without overplaying it, and the dynamic between Bloom and Penelope is chaste, sweet, like grade-school romance in a way. They’re very new to the idea of actually opening up to someone else, and their halting attempts at connection are quite affecting. Rinko Kikuchi makes a strong impression with a largely non-verbal performance as Bang Bang, an explosives-loving con artist who travels with Stephen and Bloom, as does Maximilian Schell as the gypsy Fagin who was responsible for at least some of the training of the brothers. Robbie Coltrane rounds out the supporting cast nicely, everyone having just enough time to make something of their roles, etching in small details and subtle nuance. Although I think the film’s very funny in many places, I wouldn’t really describe it as a comedy. It’s more like the comedy in the film is there to warm you to these people. The more they make you laugh, the more affection you feel for them, and the more affection you feel, the worse it hurts when Johnson starts to play rough. There are always stakes for the characters, and it’s easy to get lulled by that same false sense of security that the characters do.

I’m sure I’ll review this film in its final form once it’s done and in release later this year, but even in its still unfinished form, the cinematography by Steve Yedlin and the score by Nathan Johnson stand out as strong and distinctive and original. They both worked on BRICK, and it’s obvious that this creative team is finding a groove together, and if they’re allowed to continue, I think we might be in for some very good films indeed. As it is, THE BROTHERS BLOOM is a joy, a deceptively simple good time, and well worth your time.

Now I’ve got to catch a nap before I interview the LITTLE BRITAIN guys, post this MUMMY 3 report, and then finally get a chance to dig in and read this script about these “basterds”...

Drew McWeeny, Los Angeles