The quote begins “Opportunities multiply as they are seized,” according to Sun Tzu. Opportunity, a comedy crime movie by writer/director Rusty Rehl, doesn’t take very long to arrive at a counter narrative that dooms our would-be felons. They can’t do math, they can’t do crime, and they probably can’t spell. But there’s an exponential element that drives the 97 minute feature film. The ensemble has got hokeyness down to a science, and in the end, they all receive a passing grade.
Fade out of black, we are introduced to Patrick (Jon Waters) and he quickly evokes the stereotype. He lives in his van, and the alarm awakening him, Patrick starts his day with a regimen that he probably got from viewing a bad self-help video on YouTube. A deep breath, a motivating clap and his gargle with gatorade readies him to do pushups and crunches.
Five each at most, the score doubles down the cheesiness. As if someone said, we need something that sounds like it comes from a bad B-action/crime movie, the sound has no idea how outdated and typical it is.
By design, the same goes for the cinematography. Daniel Harper and Andrew Bishop keep it simple. No fancy lighting or sophisticated camera angles, the characters aren’t deep enough to merit an introspective framing, and they wouldn’t know what to do with it anyway.
Good for us, Waters’ portrayal is just as tone deaf to his character’s overwhelming shortcomings, and homelessness doesn’t provide clarity either. Neither does his employment as a cart boy at the local Big Box. So in keeping, Patrick deludes himself into thinking that home ownership is just a bank loan away.
The good news, he does at least have a friend, which isn’t necessarily good news. For one, Donnie (Quinn Aikele) proves that survival of the fittest doesn’t always apply. He’s got a job, living arrangements and a girl, and being a man-child right out of the playbook, Aikele kicks the paradigm into high gear.
First, the actor makes us believe he has no idea how silly he looks riding a bike, and the way he simply lets the bike fall to the ground screams denial. That’s just the cool way any successful, well adjusted adult would do it.
Then he speaks, and there’s lots of man’s and dudes. Not really breaking new ground, we’re able to forget. The actor conveys a certainty that he owns the rights and origins to the terminology, and as a consequence, we don’t care how many times we’ve seen The Big Lebowski. Of course, Patrick has been to the movies. Therefore, plenty of amusement comes from the resigned manner in which Waters tolerates his friend’s heavily borrowed persona.
Nonetheless, with Patrick in need of financial relief, he can’t help taking Donnie’s lead into returning to their previous life of petty crime. Only these details go to the next level.
Jared (Aaron Henretty) heads up a gang of Mormon gangsters and needs a little help. A flash drive of important financial information must be retrieved, and the crime boss makes his pitch to Donnie and Patrick. Trying to mask the criminal intent in respectability, we are not persuaded in the least by Henretty’s attempts at duplicity. So on point with everyone else, the silliness continues to lower our expectations, and allow the comedic lines to hit home with just enough punch.
The stage now set for the caper, things obviously go awry, but the paradigm remains on point. So we are sucked in to see where the drama goes – especially as the film adds on a few more eclectic characters.
Enter the Mormon enforcers, the pair tries to muscle Patrick into returning the stolen goods. Only, they do so with the same politeness as the door to door Saints we are all familiar with, and the recreation has Trent Martin and Jordan Akinson come off like they could be at your door kindly asking you to do the right thing.
Funny, Donnie’s girlfriend is next. Julia (Amanda Coryat) is a force, and probably because she’s the only non-idiot. Coryat’s restrained delivery conveys a woman who has a seething anger that refuses to succumb to her limited lot in life. So her character has an underlying agenda to improve her situation by any means necessary. It’s pretty easy to see, but Coryat’s gem of a performance has almost everyone around her in denial of her true self.
More funny, our heroes stumble through, and by the time the plot winds down, Opportunity puts on a pretty nice bow. So you got nothing to lose by tying one on with this crazy crew.
