This is another film that screams "I want to be a cult movie!" but just doesn't have what it takes. It starts out promising and then seems to have absolutely nowhere to go; it just becomes long, ponderous and self-indulgent. As someone who grew up going to midnight movies, "The Bad Batch" seems like its taken elements from these films ("El Topo," "Mad Max," "Kill Bill") and stitched them all together in the hopes it'll hit the mark somewhere. The performances in the film are adequate, but nothing in the script really demands much of the characters. Ms. Amirpour obviously had the support of actors like Diego Luna, Jim Carrey and Keanu Reeves, all of whom are seen briefly, but I'm willing to bet they never saw much of a script. At two hours, there's probably half an hour of real material here, the rest just feels like padding.
Review of The Bad Batch
