“COST OF A SOUL” My rating: B-
Rated R
In “Cost of a Soul” first-timer pretentiousness battles with terrific performances and a fantastic sense of atmosphere. In the end the good stuff outweighs the sketchy stuff.
Sean Kirkpatrick’s Philly-lensed crime drama (opening May 20 in KC at the Independence 20) is the winner of the first Big Break movie contest sponsored by Rogue Pictures and AMC theaters. It suggests a real talent at work.
Chris Kerson in "Cost of a Soul"
At heart it’s a coming-home story about two Iraq veterans, one black, one white.
DD (Will Blagrove) returns to his inner city home determined to live a straight life. Easier said than done, since his older brother is a biggie on the local drug scene. The best DD can hope for is to keep his impressionable younger brother out of the life.
The more interesting story follows Tommy (Chris Kerson…he looks like the love child of James Franco and Steven Tyler) who once back on the mean streets finds that he’s the father of physically impaired little girl (Maddie Morris Jones) by his old squeeze (Judy Jerome). Haunted by his work as an interrogator in Iraq, Tommy is determined to provide for his new family.
But he’s quickly cornered by his old mentor Charlie (Gregg Almquist), head of the neighborhood’s Irish mob, who calls in old debts to put the reluctant veteran to work as an enforcer. Tommy’s killing days aren’t over yet.
Eventually Tommy and DD’s paths will cross. Violently.
Kirkpatrick pulls astoundingly good perfs out of his cast of unknowns, particularly in Tommy’s side of the story. Kerson excels at radiating existential intensity, while Almquist is a perfect mobster (half garrulous paternalism, half icy killer) and Mark Borkowski shines as his dogged lieutenant.
Jerome is terrific as Tommy’s woman, angry at her abandonment but now succumbing to the possibilities of conventional domesticity, and young Miss Jones is haunting as their daughter.
Against these plusses one must weigh some sophomoric elements. Kirkpatrick names Tommy’s girl and daughter Faith and Hope, just in case we don’t understand their function.
His screenplay aims for something epic, but often feels too densely packed for its own good (there’s a promising subplot about an undercover cop that’s almost lost in the multiple narratives).
The film’s very title is portentious. And, I kid you not, Kirkpatrick introduces his own metaphysical MacGuffin, a mysterious glowing briefcase lifted directly from Tarantino’s “Pulp Fiction.” Huh?
OK, so it’s not perfect. When it does work, though, “Cost of a Soul” suggests that Sean Kirkpatrick is a filmmaker worth keeping tabs on.
That said, you’ve got to ask why AMC booked this film — basically it’s an indy art effort — in its Independence multiplex where it’s least likely to be seen by audiences that will appreciate it most.
| Robert W. Butler
Butler's Cinema Scene 
“That said, you’ve got to ask why AMC booked this film — basically it’s an indy art effort — in its Independence multiplex where it’s least likely to be seen by audiences that will appreciate it most.”
A more cynical person would say the enterprise has been set up to fail…