Review: The Laundromat is an entertaining swing and miss.
Monday, October 21, 2019 at 9:55PM
by Tony Ruggio
Steven Soderbergh's fingerprints are unmistakable and unknowable simultaneously. He bounds from genre to genre, and studio to indie and back again with such regularity that he’s difficult to pin down. The only thing you can count on is that he’ll try new things and, unless he’s indulging in Ocean’s Eleven fun, and attempt to push the boundaries of what we know as cinema. That all sounds like embellishment and it is, because Soderbergh is nothing if not a bit pretentious. His newest film, The Laundromat, is a big swing aimed at uncovering the morbid, funny, and messed-up nature of the scheming that went on behind the Panama Papers scandal. He misses the mark by half an hour. It’s The Big Short if The Big Short was in a hurry to fill you in on the minutiae, or didn’t bother to impart to you the gravity of its subject matter.
The film is only ninety or so minutes long and for a topic as heady as financial con-artists around the world, and the all-seeing, all-ignoring facilitators who allowed for them, well, the world is not enough...
Gary Oldman and Antonio Banderas in "The Laundromat"
Ninety minutes is not enough for a story of interconnecting smaller stories, all of them serving a single function in detailing the high crimes of the rich and famous. There’s an insurance scam run by one man (Jeffrey Wright) that runs over an old woman (Meryl Streep) and others (David Schwimmer) in the wake of her husband’s death, and a double-dealing case of corporate malfeasance and murder involving one European businessman (Matthias Schoenaerts), a Chinese magnate, and law enforcement. There’s even a domestic extra-marital affair of one international titan of industry (Nonso Anozie) whose family squabbles make for an amusing detour. That’s the chief problem -- The Laundromat is but a quick succession of busy nothings that end up amusing more than enlightening.
Soderbergh’s eye for digital photography is put to good use for the first time in some time, as he eschews the iPhone for real cameras and comes up full of color. For a talky film about money and terrible deeds, his film is beautiful to look at, with great depth of field and a series of vast settings to get lost in. From a Christmas-lit dive bar to a sun-kissed mansion, there’s plenty to look at while the powerful move about their environs with nary a care in the world, including for their own children in one story. Escorting them and us through these environs are Gary Oldman and Antonio Banderas as Jurgen Mossack and Ramon Fonseca, fourth wall-breaking narrators and partners in a Panama City firm representing the end of this shady, meandering rabbit hole. They make a good couple of miscreants, sauntering from set to set in expensive suits, chit-chatting with us in thick-accented prose. As the German son of a former Nazi family who fled to Panama after the war, Oldman is both too much and just right for enlivening these confusing proceedings.
Soderbergh’s frothier instincts ensure The Laundromat is entertaining, but his other instincts lead him astray. He indulges any formal idea that pops into his head and for what this time? The Laundromat is full of stunt casting that leads to nowhere except wastefulness, such as Sharon Stone and James Cromwell in one or two scenes, and Meryl Streep in a second role that crosses the line of tastefulness. I have no pearls to clutch and I wouldn’t touch them if I did, but Streep in brown-face? For what, I still don’t know. I do know he half-way makes up for it with Will Forte and Chris Parnell as Doomed Gringo #1 and Doomed Gringo #2. Nobody can say Steven Soderbergh doesn’t have a wicked sense of humor. C+
Reader Comments (23)
Incorrect
I feel like this was edited for time but they left in way too much of Banderas and Oldman talking to the camera, when those parts to me are the weakest. If it’s true that Soderbergh cut out 30 minutes, it makes me wonder if he could have re-edited it to present a more coherent film about the victims.
Streep is terrific in this film.
I am with the critics on this movie; It tried but failed/. I am not like so many of the fans on this site... no matter what their favorite actress does is GREAT... an eye blink should get her an Oscar.
I am a huge Streep fan, but this will not be one of her great performances. She was OK with what she had to work with ,....Sorry, Tom Ford, brandz and Jamie.
This movie is like if they took all of the worst parts of The Big Short and put them in a blender and poured it out. Oldman's accent is HEINOUS, Banderas talks like he's a bored high school teacher, Meryl's fussy and squeaky (that second character....MA'AM), and the dialogue is way to on the nose.
What are you talking about? I didn’t even mention her or care for the film.
I'll always love Soderbergh, but this film isn't even in the top half of his films. It's beautifully shot, but it feels oddly hallow. There's something missing, and I really do wonder what was in those 30 minutes. I also think some parts of the story just felt out of order.
Even as a fun retelling of the Panama Papers, I'm not quite sure it works. A lot of information gets lost, and at times it's easy to lose track of how things are working. I did like some of the minor stories - the daughter with the duplicitous father is quite a treat, but some of them just made me shrug.
Still, Meryl is solid here as always. Her last scene, in particular, works well only because she sells it, and that scene feels like one of the bigger acting risks she's taken in quite a few years. But, this is hardly nomination worthy. And, while Banderas is smarmy and self-assured here, and plays his role beautifully, I doubt this will help him get in with Pain and Glory (though he's good enough on his own there to make it in).
All that said, I look forward to Soderbegh's next film.
Tom Ford.... I meant this in a positive way. as in the past you extol her acting.. I am agreeing with you
Sorry JLo, Meryl is the Latina supporting actress nom this year.
What can I say about The Laundromat?
Well I can probably say that it was a easier watch on Netflix then on a major screen so maybe I viewed in through the eyes of a TV movie rather than a theatrical event.
I wish they had spent more time on the Ellen character and I think Meryl does risky, controversial strong work here. Overall the movie is trying to be Brecht’s Epic theatre and utilize the tool of alienation- think Elena (Meryl’s 2nd character made ups so badly as to not be realistic and to make you know it is a disguise) I guess is some projection of Ellen if she were no longer meek and could be a whistleblower which leads into the ending... overall I get what it was trying to do with the story being told the way it was but was not too much of a fan or will have too many repeated viewings. But again Brecht and alienation is not everyone’s cup of tea. If Soderbergh only focused on Ellen then I am afraid people would accuse him of not treating the issue globally. I liked seeing Streep with Oldman and Banderas and for some reason Streep and Soderbergh must have enjoyed working together to go right into Let Them All Talk. Would not have expected The Laundromat for Meryl at age 70
This felt like it would have made a good miniseries: An episode in China, an episode with the extramarital affair—maybe an episode dedicated to Sharon Stone's dealings with the Russians! Those parts didn't really cohere as a single narrative.
I really wish Soderbergh would just slow down and take two years to really focus and make a really good movie. He hasn't done that in a while and it's so dispiriting.
Streep misteps shame.
I'm by no means one of Streep's sycophants -- I like her fine but I would never list her as one of my favorites -- but I really enjoyed this movie, and her work in it. It's all so purposefully theatrical, the accents and the way it's shot, I found it all went down really fine.
Also the Big Short is a piece of absolute SHITE
As an optimist, I see the bright side. One more spot for an actress among the nominees.
Dud, dud, dud. Shame on Meryl for crossing the line!
Tony, thanks for a fun write-up.
I agree with Jason...The Big Short is a mess, and I think this film in infinitely superior: it's stylized in a very specific way, the choices are consistent and artful, and it's fully realized...not just throw-things-against-a-way-and-hope-they-stick like TBS.
One of Meryl's best performances in a while. It's the first time in a long, long time she is fully in service to the director and the story, and the way everything comes together in the end gives the piece unity and a dramatic payoff. The whole movie is about play-acting. Get over it.
Also probably Soderberg's funniest, most surprising and enjoyable films since THE INFORMANT.
I love the ending. It's not a great film but kind of the closest we get now to political theater in the modern world, which often struggles on how to identify and explain corruption by the rich.
Not a great movie, he kind of has been slipping considerably IMO. This was better than side effects and Unsane but still I'm waiting for him to really put in an effort. Everything seems so indifferent. I liked Streep in this, it's a bit outside of what she's done lately and I enjoyed her. Not oscar worthy but I was happy as I kind of was bit "over" her because she was just everywhere for a while.
Is it wrong that I liked this film a lot?
Is it wrong that I find all three Streep, Oldman and Banderas, award nomination worthy?
Jesus. It is absolutely not wrong!!!
i don't know quite what to say about this film. it was kind of a mess. i found myself wishing that Jeffrey Wright and Sharon Stone had bigger parts. i thought since Meryl was in it, it was going to be some big important film, but it was hardly that.
I sometimes had to pinch myself to be sure all this mess was really happening ...
What were they thinking ?