This is how far we’ve come? Woodward and Bernstein are now both Shia LeBeouf? There are some things elder generations are indeed wrong about: 3D IS cool. Movie venues ought to accommodate 20+ different films. (American) Movie fight choreography before The Matrix sucks ass. But we’re not wrong about Shia LeBeouf. I want to cheer for him the way I want to repair a clogged toilet. I’d rather hear his lines delivered by Gilbert Gottfried. And I believe him as an investigative reporter the way I believe M.C. Escher draws reality.
The Company You Keep is a figure-it-out film. No, no. You’re not supposed to figure out why Shia is in the film. You have to figure out why the gov’ment can’t catch some filthy hippies long after they stopped being filthy hippies. See, there was a group of radical freedom anti-Vietnam freedom fighters who killed a guy in a bank robbery forty years ago. When Jim Grant (Robert Redford) won’t take the case and suddenly goes on the lam, hey, 
think he’s got somethin’ to do with it? Investigative Reporter Ben Shepard (LeBooooof) is on it, handling investigative journalism much the way a troubled teen handles a jack o ’lantern.
The Company You Keep is, for the most part, a chase film. Can the once spry Redford stay ahead of the Uruguay army? I mean, the CIA. Can Shia figure out the mystery and make time with the hot law student? Can Susan Sarandon annoy an audience with only two minutes of actual screen time? And finally, will your patience give out before the movie ends. Mine didn’t.
Redford emptied out the retirement home for this one, pulling into duty Julie Christie, Nick Nolte, Chris Cooper, Stanley Tucci, Richard Jenkins and Brendan Gleeson. I didn’t know the cast going in and half-way through I expected Red 2 to break out. There’s a lot o’ leather in them thar faces. And a lot of better performances and scripts in the rear view mirror.
The 60s are over, but the crimes still remain
FBI pursuit can drive one insane.
Secrets do unravel with Sundance on the fly-a
Takes effort to solve riddles; hey don’t be Shia.
Rated R, 121 Minutes
D: Robert Redford
W: Lem Dobbs
Genre: All the Secretary-of-the-Interior’s Men
Type of person most likely to enjoy this film: Believers in investigative reporting
Type of person least likely to enjoy this film: CIA
