Title – Finestkind (2023)

Director – Brian Helgeland (A Knight’s Tale) 

Cast – Toby Wallace, Ben Foster, Jenna Ortega, Tommy Lee Jones

Plot – Fisherman and brothers Charlie (Wallace) and Tom (Foster) find themselves on the wrong side of the law and desperate to keep their heads afloat, leading to dangerous avenues involving their father Eldridge (Jones), Charlie’s love interest Mabel (Ortega) and shady crime syndicates.  

“You live, you die. It’s the in-between that counts”

Review by Eddie on 03/03/2025

I’m personally still trying to wrap my head around the fact that Finestkind is written and directed by the same Oscar winning Brian Helgeland that wrote the fantastic L.A Confidential screenplay and whose hand helped bring the likes of Mystic River or Man on Fire to life.

At one stage in its early existence linked to stars such as Jake Gyllenhaal, Ansel Elgort and Zendaya from all the way back in 2018, Finestkind had been brewing away in the Hollywood system for some time and on examination of its end result that saw Helgeland’s film land on Paramount+ towards the end of 2024 with little to no fanfare, it would have been better for this lifeless affair to float out to sea.

Proposed to be some type of fishing family drama that shoehorns in a tension riddled organised crime angle, there’s components of Finestkind’s narrative that on paper seem to be an appealing proposition but Helgeland’s film is akin to being stuck in some strange frozen moment in time where it can’t get out of first gear with the film unable to raise a pulse from beginning to end with many viewers likely to feel as though they were ripped off by a synopsis that wasn’t reflective of the end result.

Clocking in at a long feeling two hours, most of Finestkind’s runtime is dedicated to awkward family drama between Toby Wallace’s charisma free Charlie and his brother Ben Foster’s stoic and grizzled fisherman Tom as the two deal with each other, Charlie deals with Jenna Ortega’s potential new love interest Mabel and the two men’s weathered father Eldridge, played by a very bored looking Tommy Lee Jones, with a tacked on organised crime 4th act coming in at the last minute to try and save the boredom inducing day.

It’s been a long time since I’ve seen a film with such an identity crisis and lack of an identity itself, in many ways its one of the most poorly formed and structured Hollywood backed features of the last few years and further dwindles Helgeland’s standing in the industry while also damaging the likes of Australian sport Wallace’s chances of rising up the ranks with a badly casted role that has likely ruined his chances of other lead turns in the near future.

Leaving us with no real clear understanding of what we are supposed to be gaining from its narrative or what we are being asked to enjoy from a simple watching point of view, Finestkind is unable to hook us in on anything in particular as it stumbles along until its end game waltzes around, ensuring everyone involved is walking away from this project with their tales between the legs and a likely sense of joy they can put the whole DOA project behind them.

Final Say –

A brazenly lifeless and uninspired film that amounts to a whole lot of nothing across its runtime, Finestkind is full of unlikable characters and uninteresting story developments that all amount to a poor excuse of a film that does a disservice to its talented cast and willing viewers.

1 local donut shop out of 5