Taking a chapter or three from the Cohen Brothers and Quentin Tarantino, the movie Greedy People combines a group who also qualify as lying, thieving and murdering people. Working with a script by Mik Vukadinovich, director Potsy Ponciroli riffs on small town U.S.A., using the ironic but not so subtle name Providence. Providence supports not just one, but two, professional assassins, along with a bumbling mix of cops and lovers who all want a happy ending. The director maintains a light touch, using a pseudo surfer, cartoonish soundtrack emphasizing no need to take anything too seriously. Plotting resembles a comedy of errors with action spurred by mistakes and miscommunications—definitely a problem for characters caught in the web of multiple deaths, one accidental and many purposeful. Often agreeable, often dufus, the bunch of losers come to life through a cast of professionals grounded in impressive experience. Cohen Brothers alumni Tim Blake Nelson offers his usual off kilter presence, while Emmy winner Uzo Aduba of Orange is the New Black steps in with a slightly different take on a hard-nosed police captain. Joseph Gordon-Leavitt goes against type as a yee-hah kind of cop, while Yesterday’s Himesh Patel and Downton Abbey’s Lily James shuck their British accents to find their way into middle America. That middle America never reaches the heights and absolute darkness of a Cohen Brothers classic, but it easily proves itself no small town for old men…or pretty much anyone.
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