The Town: A Stupid, Overrated, Crappy Movie:

I stand by my position that The Town definitely does carry the message that it's okay to do the things that Doug and his men did (i. e. rob banks and armored cars and terrorize innocent people at gunpoint, even though it results in permanent injury and/or severe trauma to people, to protect and defend such behavior (as Claire did), and to make total dupes out of law enforcement people who're trying to do the job they've been assigned to do; bring Doug MacRay to justice, even after his friends were killed (as Claire also did). I hate the stereotypes that The Town projects; rabid Boston red sox fans, all Townies being bank robbers, etc., and the typical wholesome, angelic, good-girl next door, who does volunteer work for the community and tends a little garden (That's Claire, and she looked like the so-called typical good-girl next door.)

The Town was totally dopey, and there was too much exploding on the screen, and too many unrealistic car chases, car crashes and shoot-outs. Also, Doug's escape was too implausible...there's no way that he could've realistically gotten away. there's too much sophisticated technology at the Feds' and other law enforcement bodies' disposal available for identifying him and weeding him out for prison, plus Doug knew at some level that he'd get hunted down and caught by the law sooner or later.

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"It does not take a majority to prevail, but rather an irate, tireless minority, keen on setting brush fires of freedom in the minds of men." -- Samuel Adams (1722-1803)

If the movie Gone Baby Gone is any indication, Ben Affleck is far better when he's behind the camera than as an actor. One of the reasons that Ben Affleck fell so badly in The Town is that he bit off more than he could chew, if one gets the drift.

What you say about Claire says it in a nutshell, Yoda. She was infatuated with Doug! That's it...in a nutshell! She acted like a dumb-***ed flower-child, and didn't suffer any real consequences for it. Krista, the drugged out/alcoholic sister of Jem, who was Fergie's drug mule, was clearly no angel, but neither was Claire, as it turned out. I hate movies like this where people get away with wrongdoing, which Doug and Claire did.

I also might add that, while the robbery was not her fault, if Claire hadn't been so stupid as to hit the alarm, the beating and permanent injury of her colleague, as well as her abduction, wouldn't have happened. She was just as much a victim of her own actions, and she caused a friend and colleague to pay for it in an even bigger way than she did. I've got no sympathy for Claire, after that, either.

I did watch The Town more than once, and I ultimately took a harder, more negative viewpoint of this film, as a result. So, it's not like I didn't give The Town a fair chance.

TheUsualSuspect, I think that the Boston accents really did sound unnatural, precisely because Ben Affleck did have training that helped him get rid of his initial Boston accent. I stand by my position that they were not only forced, but exaggerated and overdone.

It's true that Doug's three accomplices in crime do suffer consequences of their crime spree; they die as a result, in a shoot-out with the Feds and cops. No sympathy there. The fact that Doug got away, unscathed to boot, is unrealistic, to boot. Affleck just wanted to work up enough audience sympathy for both Doug and Claire so that they would get away with the crap that they pulled, and that's another thing that made me dislike The Town so much. I was hoping that Doug and Claire would get their comeuppances, but unfortunately, they didn't.

It's not so much the fact that Doug grew up in Charlestown which resulted in his becoming a professional criminal. Since kids who grow up in households with criminals are even more likely to get into crime themselves, the fact that Doug's father was a professional armed felon (bank robber and murderer), and then he was raised by "Jem"'s family, and had "Jem" who was also a professional career criminal (a bank/armored car robber and murderer, who'd also spent some time in prison for murder), as sort of a brother, also contributed, big time, even more than the neighborhood that he grew up in, to Doug's becoming a criminal, and not really being able to escape it.

I also might add that Doug was not an 18-20 some odd year old kid when he committed these bank robberies. He was well into his 30's, and a professional armed felon and wanted fugitive. Therefore, since crime was Doug's career, his chances of escaping it really are slim to none, imho.

I never said you didn't.

Why do you feel so heated about The Town? I've never seen someone so antagonistic about a film on here -- except maybe me. This movie appears to not have rolled off your shoulder. And I'm not looking for the answers you already gave -- the ones about the film. What makes you so unnerved by it to keep going on and on? Was there anything about The Town that you did like?

actually, this thread reminds me a lot of BobbyB's intense hatred for Heavenly Creatures thread. and it was for a lot of the same reasons that WSSLover hates The Town; glorifying criminals, the antagonists being awful people, etc.

yeah, click that hot link and be entertained. you know you want to.

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letterboxd

Hmm. I haven't seen Heavenly Creatures.

I really don't think The Town glorifies criminals. If they do, I didn't see a problem with it in that film. Why do they rob banks? I don't know. But so what? First of all, it's only a movie and it's entertainment. Second, they're human beings. They haven't had great lives. They were raised in horrible surroundings. Ben Affleck's character had lost his mother -- and nothing those guys did was, in my opinion, as bad as what that one guy had done to Ben Affleck's mother. And I loved the fact that Ben Affleck got revenge, too.

As for Ben's character stalking and dating that girl from the bank... if some uglier guy had done it, I admit, it might suck, but BEN AFFLECK?? Boy, if only I could call 1-800-RENT-ABUSE and ask for him. I thought what he did was beautiful. What a great way to make up to a woman after you've scared the life out of her -- sex and romance. And he doesn't even tell her who he is! I think it's beautiful. I think it's beautiful that he tries hard to avoid letting her know who he is. There is something so beautiful about it to me. So sexy and mysterious. He is looking to redeem himself. Psychologically, I bet it all stems to his own conflicts about losing his mother. His twisted past makes him twisted to women. But at least he goes looking for redemption with the woman at the bank. This is probably why the woman - I forget her name - Claire - dedicates that ice-hockey rink to his mother. She is symbolically, on a deep psychological level, his mother. You know those theories about how people marry people who are like their parent? That's what Claire is. That's why Ben went after her. He was looking for his mother - the one who disappeared. She was a replacement. Of course you can't go looking for a replacement to actually be your mother (unless you're into that sort of thing), so you have to find the replacement in a lover.

The film even showcases the redemption theme via the masks that the bank robbers wear:



First we have the more masculine, more bullying skull masks, but note the longish hair, like a woman's. This is the mask worn when he robs the bank that Claire works at. This is the look of the renegade son, the disturbed male sociopath.

But after Ben Affleck meets Claire, he becomes...



THE NUN

The second mask, worn later in the film, is the womanly nun mask. The motherly authority figure. The religious aspect hints at redemption, while coupled with the nun look, showcases the inner demons with Ben Affleck's character and his missing, dead mother. He is starting to soften up - and so is the whole group he's with. This is why they eventually all get killed, except for Ben Affleck -- they are losing their hardened masculinity, represented earlier by the skull masks, and turning into female religious figures. Ben Affleck is psychologically reuniting with his mother - through Claire - and becoming transformed spiritually - and it shows though this nun mask. The whole nun costume, actually. The costumes that the bank robbers wear shows that their characters are changing. They are becoming affected by women and trying to do the right thing. At least this sort of thing has already infiltrated the heart and soul of Ben Affleck's character, who is the alpha in the group -- not Jeremy Renner, who is merely second in command. His death at the end - while Ben Affleck lives - shows who is and is not in charge. Ben Affleck, affected by Claire, his mother, and doing the right thing, brings down his organization. This is a redemption movie. This is not about glorifying criminals -- this is about ending criminal acts.

Do you know what Bahston accents sound like?

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"A laugh can be a very powerful thing. Why, sometimes in life, it's the only weapon we have."

Suspect's Reviews

Then why is it so "overrated"? I know, stupid question since you'll give me the same three reasons again.

I will admit that I think that Heavenly Creatures is better than The Town, but not by all that much.

How about some people agree to disagree, or is that just "stupid, overrated, crappy" too?

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It's what you learn after you know it all that counts. - John Wooden
My IMDb page

Really thou, who hates a movie because the protagonist is a criminal? If that's the case you must really hate A Clockwork Orange.

I give up, man. You say you stand by the idea that The Town is saying it's okay to do these things...but why? Whenever I ask, you just point to the fact that he got away. Nevermind that the entire thing was a disaster, and the entire premise of the movie is that he wants to stop being a criminal. And then you type up five or six more paragraphs that describe people's behavior, or talks about how stupid they are, but doesn't in any way show that the film is condoning what they do.

I really don't see it. If you just don't like the acting, or direction, or whatever, that's fine. No point in arguing about that. But I see little to no serious evidence to support the idea that The Town has some skewed moral message. It's about a criminal with a conscience who wants to get out of the lifestyle, and finds that doing so involves death, destruction, and a lot of luck. That's blatantly, obviously not glorifying what he's doing. It's glorifying his decision to stop doing it.

The Town was bad because the relationships between the characters was not believable or realistic, the main romance wasn't developed and unconvincing, the second robbery is representative of how the film was written in its own favor (no police, helicopters, FBI at all even though it was known about), this might as well be a mash up of Heat, Point Break, and any other crap robbery movie with enough action to override the derivative.

See, was that so hard?

I hope BobbyB finally managed to get a clue.

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#31 on SC's Top 100 Mofos list!!

i think the more attention a movie gets the more haters it get. This movie was legit.

I certainly do, because I'm from the Boston area, and I've come in contact with quite afew real people from some of those Boston neighborhoods, and from the Boston area, generally.

That's a matter of opinion. How do we really know if Doug stopped robbing banks and armored cars for good. First of all, he ended up leaving Claire behind because he was on the lam from the law, especially after killing "Fergie" and Rusty. Secondly, Doug had gotten what he really wanted out of Claire; a promise from her not to squeal to the Feds, or else! Thirdly, at some level, Doug knew that his days of hiding out in Florida were numbered; sooner or later, he'd be hunted down, caught by the law and either sent to prison where he belonged, or possibly gunned down by the law.

As for Claire, I'm disgusted with her for helping Doug out. Either she'd naive and innocent as they come, or she's willfully stupid. No sympathy for her, on my part.

What I find bothersome is the fact that so many people are so intolerant of dissenting opinions on The Town, and they make it obvious, either explicitly or subtlely, which is disgusting.

I also stand by my position on the message that The Town conveys.

To each their own, ash_is_the_gal, but I really do feel differently about The Town than most people, and I stand by my positions on this film.