‘Roofman’ Review – Channing Tatum Wants To Be A Toys R Us Kid
Roofman is a film directed by Derek Cianfrance (Blue Valentine, The Place Beyond the Pines) and much of it fits his style. It stars Channing Tatum in a role that shows he is more than the guy who’s been chasing Gambit for over a decade, and can do character pieces about flawed individuals. This is based on a true story that sounds like a movie script, which is probably why it got made in the first place.
Tatum plays Jeffrey Manchester, an armed robber and wanted fugitive who went to jail for holding up a McDonald’s. His MO is breaking in through the roof and, at gunpoint, making the early-shift employees empty the safe. The name of the game was “nice and easy”; Manchester gets the bag, gets away clean, and nobody gets hurt. He robbed other places with the same method and code of honor, but he is notorious for the breakfast-time McD’s job.
It’s the one that got him caught, but his overall notoriety comes from what happened next. Biding his time by becoming a model prisoner, Manchester finds his moment and secretly hitches a ride on the underside of a truck. Trying to lay low and get out of town, he holes up in a Toys R Us, eating candy and bathing in the sinks after hours.
Nobody notices except for the missing inventory until the fateful day he, soaped up and nowhere to hide, surprises the store manager (Peter Dinklage).
Though his cover is on the verge of blown, Manchester sticks it out because of the relationship and new life he is building with one of the employees, a divorced single mom named Leigh (Kirsten Dunst). He starts going to her local church, and meets the pastor (Ben Mendelsohn), while also spending more time at Leigh’s place, and with her two daughters, whom he dotes on like some charming ersatz stepdad.
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Things are looking up despite his web of deception, but this second chance won’t last and was objectively doomed from the start. The law is closing in and choosing to be with Leigh leads to Jeff’s inevitable downfall. I admit that sounds compelling, but I’m probably overselling how interesting the story actually is.
After watching Roofman, I decided to sit and ruminate over it for a while, which I might have done for longer than I should have. It didn’t stick with me the way it seemed to with everybody else, and the amount of thinking I do about it focuses on this analysis.
It’s an indie comedy with dramatic edges, but while I was watching it in the theater, only one person was laughing. Mostly, that was when Tatum was running from police or back to his hiding spot in the Toys R Us with his butt gratuitously exposed. That person got their money’s worth; I, on the other hand, wasn’t on the same wavelength.
There are solid performances, particularly from Tatum and Kirsten Dunst, but that being the biggest thing to recommend reminds me of another recent star-driven vehicle, The Smashing Machine. Like Dwayne Johnson and that film more generally, I get the sense Tatum and Dunst are going for the award-season nominations, and I won’t be surprised if they receive a few nods or wins, especially at The Critics’ Choice.
Maybe Roofman goes higher. Personally, I don’t think it is in the weight class of an Oscar contender. It is getting rave reviews, sure, but the best-reviewed and high-scoring films everybody saw don’t win anymore. Besides that, this one probably won’t be remembered in due time – sort of like the case it’s based on.
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Roofman
PROS
- The cast
- Captures the nostalgia for Toys R Us decently
- Turns into a quasi-faith-based film in spots that is more realistic than most of those
CONS
- Though comedic, it unevenly bends a few genres
- Cianfrance and Tatum want you to like a common criminal
- Takes place in the mid-2000s but the sense of time and place feels scattershot
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