The most unique NYC crime thriller in a long time…
film review
TUNER
Running time: 109 minutes. R (language throughout, drug use, transient nudity, some violence). In theaters.
Just when you thought NYC crime thrillers had run out of new concepts, right here comes “Tuner,” a refreshingly creative and fascinating thug film that focuses on compelling and wealthy characters over chases and shootouts.
What units director Daniel Roher’s movie aside from, say, last 12 months’s overpraised “Caught Stealing” with Austin Butler? The main man’s backstory, for one.
Niki (Leo Woodall), a former music prodigy and current apprentice piano turner, suffers from hyperacusis, a condition that makes him extraordinarily delicate to loud noises. Hearing an ambulance siren, for instance, will lead to excruciating pain and ringing ears. He may even go out cold. That’s no bueno for anyone who spends even a minute in New York.
Leo Woodall (seen above) stars as a uniquely gifted music knowledgeable in “Tuner.” Black Bear via AP
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What Niki, who wears specialised headphones, discovers by happenstance is that the disorder that makes it extraordinarily tough for him to lead an atypical life also provides him an unmatchable knack for cracking safes. How enjoyable is that?
Late one night time, while he’s working on a ritzy buyer’s piano when the house owners aren’t home, he overhears a heist in progress upstairs. Niki’s goaded into opening the secure by the clumsy robbers — Uri (Lior Raz), Benny (Nissan Sakira) and Yoni (Gil Cohen) — which he does with stunning ease. From then on, he’s caught up in the profitable world of high-end thievery.
If you may image Woodall from “The White Lotus” or as Bridget Jones’ boy toy in the most latest sequel, he’s not precisely a nerd who buries himself in books. He tends to skew “hunk with confidence.”
The fact that his latest character is jacked, artistically inclined, delicate and uniquely suited to stealing Rolexes and wads of money makes for all kinds of engaging contradictions. And this is the younger British actor at his most inviting, tortured and terrific.
Niki’s work as an apprentice tuner leads him to the underworld of secure cracking. Black Bear via AP
But past the after-dark break-ins is the tender story of his ailing restore store boss Harry — performed with grandpa softness and deli-counter humor by Dustin Hoffman — and his spouse, Marla (Tovah Feldshuh). Their thread of the movie has a completely different really feel from the seedy thefts.
This aspect of “Tuner” is a sort of autumn, old-world New York film, like “Moonstruck.” For a while anyway. The couple have fallen on laborious instances and have to pay Harry’s medical payments. Niki’s new enterprise may help them out, or get them entangled in a nasty underworld.
And his moonlighting gig will certainly get in the way in which of his budding romance with piano scholar Ruthie (Havana Rose Liu), from whom he hides his harmful — and maybe lethal — secret.
Another deviation from the standard crime film: Roher, who has beforehand directed wonderful documentaries such as “Navalny,” builds a full of life world of sounds: the press and spinning of vault gears, the plush swell of piano, the taking aside of a child grand, Niki’s muffled perspective brought on by his cans and earplugs and the punishing shriek of an airhorn.
“Tuner” marks Daniel Roher’s (proper) first narrative function movie. Black Bear via AP
That rigorously calibrated cacophony energizes “Tuner”’ and makes it all the more gripping, claustrophobic and pulse-pounding.
While there are the anticipated gunshots and ensuing swimming pools of blood, the film’s most violent weapon seems to be noise. Eventually, I started to view a smoke alarm with the same risk stage as a machete. Conversely, the clatter and racket are also its most fantastically expressive paintbrush.
Roher, in his spectacular first go at a narrative movie, has completely paired unique storytelling, layered performances and borderline immersive audio. Fine-tuned, if you want.
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