Triple 9

Make sure you go with someone you love, who drinks plenty of caffeine, so they can wake you up when the movie is over.

Triple 9 is one of those movies with a tossed salad mix of plots, subplots, twists and turns.

Casey Affleck stars as Chris Collins - the new cop in the department who doesn’t really fit in.

Anthony Mackie stars as his partner, Marcus Belmont, who also secretly happens to be part of a gang of thieves being sought after for their daring heist of an Atlanta bank.

Woody Harrelson is Jeffery Allen – Chris’s uncle and the detective trying to capture the gang.

An almost unrecognizable Kate Winslet is Irina – the Russian mobster who employs the gang (maybe Kate will be happy no one recognizes her in this movie).

And it goes on and on and on as if any of this matters.

Triple 9 feels like a movie that wishes it was The Departed, but it’s really two action packed heist scenes wrapped around a bunch of boring garbage.

Director John Hillcoat and writer Matt Cook fail to deliver intrigue, mystery, tension, or compelling stories that make us care about the characters. One has to wonder what such a great group of actors saw in this muddled mess of a movie.

Instead of focusing on one or two strong stories, Hillcoat is attempting to pull together 5 or 6 stories, which doesn’t leave enough time for any of them to become important and detailed enough for us to care.

Triple 9 is a movie going through the motions.

Triple 9 is rated R for strong violence and language throughout, drug use and some nudity.

115 Minutes