Shia LaBeouf’s latest film, The Tax Collector, has been criticized by critics as “incompetent,” “a bloody mess” and “one of the most horrific viewing experiences of the year.”
The crime thriller, which also starred Bobby Soto and premiered on August 7, was written and directed by David Ayer, who was also behind films Suicide Squad, Training Day and Fury.
The film follows the characters of LaBeouf and Soto, Creeper and David, as ‘tax collectors’ and detainees for criminals from Los Angeles The Wizard, Jimmy Smits.
Critics have spotted David Ayer’s new film, The Tax Collector, starring Shia LaBeouf (left) and Bobby Soto (right) and premiered on August 7
Rotten Tomatoes lists the film’s critics’ score as 18 percent, indicating that it is’ rotten ‘
Earlier in the year, the film made headlines when people accused LaBeouf of being in ‘brownface’ for portraying a Latino character despite being white, a claim that Ayer refuted.
Ayer tweeted on July 1: ‘Shia plays a whiteboy who grew up in the hood. This is a Jewish guy playing a white character. Also the only white guy in the movie. ‘
Now that the film is out, however, it is attracting negative attention for a very different reason – including the stereotypical portrayal of Latinos, great violence, incoherence and bad dialogue.
As of Saturday, Rotten Tomatoes The Tax Collector has given a ‘rotten’ critics’ score of just 18 per cent, based on 34 reviews, while its audience ratings at just 50 per cent are based on eight reviews.
‘A tax and misdemeanor crime, The Tax Collector fails to gain much significant interest,’ ‘is the film’s Rotten Tomatoes summary.
The Los Angeles Times began its review by noting that ‘toxic macho energy permeates the film’ and describes it as’ a hurtfully exploitative massacre that still regurgitates the negative image of Latino people so transparently in media.
The Tax Collector centers around two men who work as enforcers for a crime lord in Los Angeles. Shia LaBeouf (right) got a real tattoo of the name of his characters, Creeper, on his chest for the role
Critics tweeted their not-too-fluttering thoughts and reviews about The Tax Collector
Critic Carlos Aguilar calls it ‘one of the most gruesome viewing experiences of the year’ and says the film ‘is based on a trite visual language, built on obvious flashbacks and vague images that match the unimaginatively terrifying writing where each Latino in sight is a gangster. ‘
The New York Times, meanwhile, called the film “generic” and noted its “madly illogical plot.” ‘
The Tax Collector was written and directed by David Ayer, who was also behind Suicide Squad and Fury
Critic Jeannette Catsoulis wrote the characters were ‘primarily motivated and hilariously hackneyed’, noting LaBeouf – and his costers – were not ‘forced’ against violence ‘by’ weight of stereotyping and dialogue ‘.
The Hollywood Reporter called it a “well-executed film” and said it “had many admirable goals, such as creating layered roles for the Latino observing community and spending production dollars in areas that could benefit from the economic impetus.” .
But despite the goals, ‘this grim carnage feels too routine to be of much importance’, wrote critic David Rooney.
Although he praised LaBeouf’s performance in the film, he wrote: ‘There’s too little depth to worry about the characters and too little imagination at work to pay The Tax Collector. ‘
IndieWire, however, blew up LaBeouf’s performance in the ‘naked’ film, noting that the actor’s seeing his star and strutting through a character and culturally insensitive performance as a problem-thug named Creeper who certainly did not oblige him to tattoo the name of his character across his chest. ‘
The 52-year-old filmmaker explained: ‘Shia plays a whiteboy who grew up in the hood. This is a Jewish guy playing a white character. Also the only white guy in the movie
Critics disagreed on whether LaBeouf’s (left) performance was well done or not
Comedian George Lopez also died in the film, playing the uncle of David, a criminal who also owns a car repair business
The audience also took to Twitter to express how bad they were even though the film was after it debuted
While filming the movie, LaBeouf tattooed ‘Creeper’ across his chest, under a portrait of his mother, who rocked a rodeo cowboy, meant to symbolize his foreign father, according to reports.
Critic Eric Kohn, who gave the film a D +, also called LaBeouf’s performance a ‘two-bit Latino burlesque’ and said the film’s script ‘feels like it was written for video game shots’.
The film was also described as ‘a slur of vulgar threats and violent outbursts’.
Variety’s review stated that the film ‘is bloody, barely cohesive and almost fun when your face is dragged across asphalt from a moving SUV.’
Critic Peter Debruge also called The Tax Collector a ‘bizarre edited action film’, but slammed back claims that the film was racist, writing ‘although it is true that there are almost no non-criminals in the film, it is small-minded to suggest that Ayer implies that everyone in South Central is some kind of gangster, or that the way one of these characters speaks – including the Chicano-accented mumblings of lonely white boy LaBeouf, appropriate from those around him – represents all Latinos. ‘
RogerEbert.com gave the film a thumbs down, with critic Brian Tallerico citing that the film ‘is so deeply incompetent that it fights practical criticism.’
‘Once you get past the awful casual racist stereotypes, non-existent character depth, incoherent plot, clichéd dialogue, and baffling editing, what’s perhaps most insulting is how intoxicatingly boring the whole affair ended,’ Tallerico wrote.
“If you’re going to make this a movie, at least try to make it fun!”
He speculates that coronavirus was responsible for the way the film went.
“I do not know if the blinding ineptitude in terms of basic elements like editing and plots in the second half of this film could be attributed to COVID-19, but that’s the nicest thing I can imagine,” he wrote.
Chicago Sun-Times reviewer Richard Roeper claimed the film was an “underachieving, overly violent urban gangster movie with a twisting storyline and a conquered final twist.”
Although he noted that there are intriguing setups at the right pace early on. ‘
The Wrap’s Steve Pond wrote the film ‘proud of a lot of posturing and a lot of gang-movie clichés but flails instead of giving us a lot of reason to worry’ and that it is an ‘over-the-top exercise in melodramatic brutality’ .
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