Serenity (2019) *

Directed by:  Stephen Knight

Starring:  Matthew McConaughey, Anne Hathaway, Jason Clarke, Djimon Hounsou, Diane Lane, Jeremy Strong, Rafael Sayegh

It now makes sense why Serenity's trailers were so vague in an age in which they reveal almost everything about a movie but the end credits.    But, the trailers aren't hiding anything deep or next level, instead it is concealing just what an odd duck of a movie this is.    No worries.   The opening weekend box-office grosses suggest Serenity won't be around long enough to be discovered by audiences.   It will be available at Redbox quicker than you can say Serenity.

Matthew McConaughey stars and continues his string of duds since his Oscar-winning role in Dallas Buyers Club (2013).    The exception is Interstellar, but only barely.   Free State of Jones (2016) and White Boy Rick (2018) failed to impress, and now we have Serenity, which reunites McConaughey with his Interstellar co-star Hathaway and leaves both looking adrift in a bizarre story.   McConaughey plays Baker Dill, a chain-smoking, rum-guzzling fishing boat captain who is so intent on catching a massive, elusive tuna that he takes over the fishing line from his customers who pay hundreds of dollars to go deep sea fishing on his boat.    Baker's first mate Duke (Hounsou) not unreasonably objects to Baker wanting to catch the tuna himself, because this makes the paying customers mad.    The tuna is Baker's Moby Dick, for reasons revealed later if not exactly made clear.

The island on which Baker resides is seemingly in the middle of nowhere, and everyone knows everyone's business, which is discussed at the one bar on the island or in the local bait shop.    Baker lives in what looks like a converted mini-mobile, and "takes showers" by jumping naked off a cliff into the sea below.    When Baker is short on funds, he becomes a trick for a lonely woman (Lane), who has an off-putting habit of wearing a robe while having sex.   She pays him, and longingly looks out the window awaiting Baker's return.    What role will she play in the events to come?    None, as it seems.    Lane's character is completely unnecessary, although she won't be the only one.

Baker is seemingly an Iraq war veteran who came home to find his wife Karen (Hathaway) with another man and he lit out for this remote island while pining to see his son again.    One night, Karen reappears and offers Baker $10 million to kill her abusive husband (Clarke), who appears to be a rich asshole with a nasty streak just waiting to rear its ugly head.   Baker balks at this proposal, while Duke flat out tries to talk him out of it and a bespectacled, buttoned-up man in a suit tries to track down Baker and keeps missing him by twenty seconds.

Because the people behave strangely and the island is like no place on Earth, it is not difficult to realize all is not what it seems.    We see cutaway shots of Baker's son pounding away furiously on a computer keyboard while his mother and her no-good new husband argue in the next room.    But, when the twist is revealed, and then another twist on top of that one, I was aghast at the silliness of it all.    Serenity is maddening in its attempt to attach some deep meaning to these events and characters, and simply keeps burying itself in stupidity.  

Once everything is sorted out, it becomes understood Serenity is just biding its time until it can spring its Big Reveal on you, so I stopped caring.    Why bother investing my energy into something which I know isn't really real anyway?    The film's ending is supposed to be an emotional high, but how could it be based on how things turned out?    Are we expected to even care about anything by that point?    Serenity is constructed around its plot twists, without any thought to how ludicrous and telegraphed they are.    If Serenity is the best work McConaughey and Hathaway could find, McConaughey should stick to Lincoln car ads, while Hathaway should inquire as to whether a sequel to Les Miserables is somehow in the works.