'Easy Does It' is an Incoherent Crime Film That Wears Out Its Welcome Quickly [Review]

Arriving over ten years after the faux-Grindhouse bubble burst, post-Tarantino “Death Proof,” Will Addison’sEasy Does It” fatally mistakes headache-inducing visuals and unending nervously delivered dialogue for style, bludgeoning the viewer with a pastiche of better films that wears out its welcome way before the credits start rolling. Ostensibly about two losers who rob their way from Louisiana to California, the skeleton plot is really an excuse for Addison to show off every editing trick he’s ever seen, somehow crafting a visually overwhelming, yet utterly incoherent, film that is sinfully boring. 

Following Jack (Ben Matheny, who also co-wrote with Addison) and Scottie (Matthew Paul Martinez) as two halfwits from Louisiana in the 1970s, stuck in a dead-end restaurant job and hustling for cash on the side. When Jack receives a postcard from his dead mother claiming that she buried treasure in San Clemente, California, the boys set off on a road trip, robbing gas stations and taking the nerdy Colin (Cory Dumesnil) hostage along the way. Of course, Colin turns from hostage to confidant quickly, and the three men soon make headlines for their cross-country robberies. All the while, they are pursued by the baseball bat wielding Blue Eyes (Susan Gordon), daughter of the Louisiana kingpin King George (Linda Hamilton) who wants a piece of the treasure.  

If there is an MVP of this film, it’s Linda Hamilton. Yet despite her outsize prominence on the poster, she’s only in the film for maybe 10 minutes. Sporting braids and a gold tooth, she’s clearly in a world of her own, comically threatening the boys. If the movie was about her, maybe it would’ve been tolerable. She’s obviously the reason that this film has gotten any type of release. Yet, we are struck with Matheny and Martinez as the protagonists. The two play every scene at 11, taking their deadbeat characters to a jittery extreme, refusing to let the characters, and by extension film, breathe for a second. Instead, they provide wall-to-wall commentary, explaining every robbery and action ad nauseam. While their annoying tendencies are obviously character traits, they make for insufferable companions. 

Addison, as well, matches them with hyperactivity, frantically throwing every possible visual trick at the screen, hoping something will stick. This includes, but unfortunately is not limited to, color tinting, split screen, zooms, grainy footage, changing aspect ratios, etc. It’s a valiant effort that mistakes most directing for good directing. Every frame is stuffed with some effect, tiring out the audience within the first few minutes. It’s a highlight reel of every possible directorial choice all at once. 

If that wasn’t enough, we are also given bookends in which characters explain their conception of the “American Dream” directly to the camera, as if Addison, and Methany, weren’t sure the audience would get their overall, decidedly not complicated, theme. These framed interviews serve as a microcosm for the problems of the entire film, it’s not nearly as smart or fun as it thinks it is. Instead, “Easy Does It” hammers the viewer by pitching everything at hyperspeed, overstaying its welcome in the first few minutes. [D]