One-Liners: Veterans

A couple of old pros fumble around in middle age:

THE DROP (B-minus) - This is Brooklyn Catholic macho bunk, but it gets under your skin.

Beware of the pedigree here. Writer Dennis Lehane (adapting his story "Animal Rescue") shoved this symbolism down our throats a decade ago with the bloated "Mystic River" and "Gone Baby Gone." And director Michael Roskam previously laid the thuggishness on thick with "Bullhead" a couple of years ago. Ladle on the symbolism -- we actually get a little ceramic angel with a broken wing that needs fixing, to go along with a vulnerable puppy -- and it's like 15 rounds of Scorsese vs. Ferrara.

We don't need another mumbling, bumbling heist movie, but a strong cast and a powerful mood put this over the top. Cousins Marv (James Gandolfini) and Bob (Tom Hardy) used to be up-and-comers in the underworld but they lost a showdown and now run a bar that's a front for Chechen mobsters who use it as a money drop to launder cash. Both Marv and Bob seems to be working their own angles. And Bob is menaced by the unhinged Eric Deeds (Matthias Schoenaerts, who starred in "Bullhead") now that Bob has Eric's dog and girlfriend (a still-struggling Noomi Rapace, formerly of the Dragon Tattoo).

It seems as if everyone has a score to settle or a scar to explain, and nobody can trust nobody. The menace builds, and it's not just the cute pitbull who seems to be in perpetual peril. This is the kind of gritty drama in which a working stiff tells a nosy cop not to mess with his neighborhood bar. (To catch all the dialogue, peppered with mumbles and accents, turn on the subtitles.)

Hardy carries the film (like he did in "Locke"), giving Bob a mix of guile and dimwittedness. This noble-simpleton role used to go to Eric Roberts ("They took my thumbs, Charlie!") or, in a perfect world, Richard Edson. Gandolfini is fine, but he's pretty much playing Tony Soprano's sad-sack alter-ego, rocking a Jets beer cozy instead of an Escalade. Schoenaerts is effectively intimidating. And a smooth John Ortiz (the love interest in HBO's "Togetherness") fills in the gaps as a snoopy NYPD Columbo. Rapace still hasn't recovered from Brian DePalma's "Passion," but she doesn't embarrass herself, either.

Wither simple Bob and his puppy? Roskam and Lehane deliver a powerful climax, ending and coda. You might feel compelled to shower off the stink of Red Bull and hair gel after this, but the hour-45 isn't a bad way to spend a night in the 'hood.

THE HUMBLING (B) - Greta Gerwig is a wonder. A couple of hours with her is never a waste of time.

Here she bucks up Al Pacino, sleepwalking with charm through his role as Simon Axler, a fading actor who is losing not only his professional skills but perhaps his mind. And his libido has seen better days, too. Which doesn't stop 30-something Pegeen (Gerwig) from suspending her 15-year experimentation with lesbianism to seduce Simon, a longtime friend of her parents (the entertaining Dianne Wiest and Dan Hedaya) and a man twice her age.

This has an anachronistic creak to it -- the old man banging the woman half his age -- courtesy of wistful writer Buck Henry (interpreting a Philip Roth novel with a young woman, newcomer Michal Zebede, as co-writer) and veteran nostalgist Barry Levinson ("Diner," etal.) behind the camera. Charles Grodin also brings a 1970s vibe as Simon's hectoring agent (offering him either King Lear or a $150,000 payday for a hair-restoration commercial). They capture the distress of an old man fumbling to get by in a new era.

Simon, in his last performance, dove face-first off the stage (in one of several parallels to "Birdman") and, after a stint in a psych ward, he now finds himself shuffling around an old country house and Skyping with his therapist (Dylan Baker) until Pegeen pops over and pumps him full of life again. Meantime, a cohort from the psych ward, the ominously named Sybil (a delightful Nina Arianda) hounds him with an offer of cash to kill her child-abusing husband.

Characters flit in and out, and as the movie unfolds, it becomes more and more difficult to tell what's really happening and what's a figment of Simon's imagination. Despite the somnambulism, Pacino as an actor seems more engaged and alive than he has in quite a while. The supporting cast energizes him. He has memorable confrontations with Arianda, Grodin and Wiest and, in the film's climax, a searing knock-down/drag-out with Gerwig, which itself is worth the price of admission.

Levinson, meanwhile, keeps things rolling. His shots of Pegeen swimming at night in a heated pool in winter, steam billowing as Simon looks on like a wounded puppy, is magical. Gerwig is doing a variation on her aimless 20-somethings from "Frances Ha" and "Greenberg," as if that young woman has matured and deepened emotionally. It's such a pleasure watching the best actress of her generation go off exploring.