With a cast including legendary actors and actresses, one would expect much of the film because of the talent in the work.
Even though Cormac McCarthy is known for writing confusing works, The Counselor, which featured Brad Pitt, Cameron Diaz, Penelope Cruz, and Javier Bardem, did a poor job of telling what could have been a great story.
Everyone seems to be incredibly wise, and it creates ramblings in the movie in which a person can get lost.
The movie, directed by Ridley Scott, leaves a lot of questions unanswered and can get confusing at times.
The movie opens at the Mexican border with a man on a green motorcycle speeding back into Texas, then Counselor (Michael Fassbender) and Laura (Penelope Cruz) laying intimately in bed.
Then, several men who appear to be Mexicans transport drugs in a sanitary truck.
The sanitary truck carrying the drugs was stolen by two different set of people throughout the movie.
It can be assumed that the first set of carjackers were professional, but had a bigger role because of how they were killed and the view loses track of who was over the theft of the truck.
Also, there’s power players Malkina (Cameron Diaz) and Reiner (Javier Bardem).
It is revealed that Cameron Diaz’s hypersexual and intelligent character is involved with Bardem’s; however, throughout the movie, it seems that Malkina was pulling all of the strings to begin with.
The movie doesn’t show how Diaz’s character got involved with Bardem’s saying that her actions affect the lives of all of the main characters.
It was insinuated that Counselor was a dirty lawyer when he and Laura were approached by a disgruntled client who caused a scene.
This is the first time and the last time that Tony (Toby Kebbell) is seen in the movie.
The scene was misleading, making viewers think that his part may be bigger and that he may be seen again.
There was no background or light shined on the situation that appeared to be steaming between Counselor and Toby.
Brad Pitt’s character, Westray, is the middle man in whatever deal Counselor has with the Mexican Cartel, but is killed after he goes on the run when Ruth’s (Rosie Perez) son head is decapitated while riding his motorcycle for the package he was carrying.
In the scene featuring Ruth (Perez), she is incarcerated for capitol murder and her son is revealed to be the man riding the motorcycle in the opening scene.
Now recognized as “The Green Hornet” because he (Ruth’s son) is a transporter for the Mexican Cartel, this is the only part of Ruth’s back story that is given.
Westray dies believing that he was killed by the Cartel, but it is shown that Malkina was behind that as well and the biggest villain of the movie is shown once.
The next big question that was left unanswered was the cameo appearance of Dean Norris, otherwise known as DEA agent Hank Schrader from A&E’s Breaking Bad.
Although Norris’ role was the buyer of the drugs from the sanitary truck, the movie did a horrible job separating him from his infamous ‘Breaking Bad’ character role.
All of the actors and actresses performances, especially Michael Fassbender’s, was amazing and gave the movie life.
However, the highlight of the film was the showcase of Diaz’s acrobatic skills as Reiner tells, in extreme details, Counselor the erotic tale of Malkina and his Ferrari.
This is the first written screenplay by McCarthy, author of No Country for Old Men.
The Counselor provided minimum insight on all characters and had a hard storyline to follow, proving that a movie can be bad even with an all-star cast.
