What did you do today?  I woke up, took a shower, had some breakfast, killed someone (just kidding,) but seriously what did you do today?  Can you remember?  What did you do yesterday?  What if you couldn’t remember?  What if you were in a really bad car accident and can’t remember much at all.  What if you had to write down a list of things so you had to go through your day everyday.  Even the simplest of tasks.  Then you have our main character in today’s review, “The Lookout.”

“The Lookout” is about Chris Pratt, played by Joseph Gordon-Levitt, a once promising hockey player gets into a car accident, which turned his life upside down.  Now, he lives his life with a handicap, memory loss.  His roommate and closest friend Lewis, played by Jeff Daniels, is a blind man.  At night, Chris is a janitor to a local bank.  One night at a local bar, he meets Gary, played by Matthew Goode, who befriends him and introduces him to a more normal life.  After a while, Gary asks Chris to help him and his friends with a job.  To help rob the bank he works at.

As I watched the movie, I really fell for the main three characters.  Each of them was really well thought out.  I loved that each of the three has a handicap which each deals with at all times.  Chris has his memory problem.  Lewis is blind.  Gary, who comes off as a strong character, has asthma and needs an inhaler.  It was great to see that each character is still fallible no matter how strong they think they are.

What I also loved while watching the film was the watching was a very old theme that really worked for this type of movie, good verse evil.  The good verse evil in the Lewis character and evil in the Gary character.  I think that’s why this movie is so strong.  Seeing Chris go up against both types of characters and not fully realizing what he’s going until it’s too late.  This movie also stars Isla Fisher, from “Wedding Crashers,” who plays a love interest to Chris and Bruce McGill who plays Chris’s controlling father.

But as much I loved watching the other supporting characters, Joseph’s betrayal of a Chris was just beyond playing a character.  You can tell that he did his research in playing this character, which he did ten months prior to filming.  What I’m very shocked about is that he didn’t get any award nominations for this role.  He totally should have.

“The Lookout” was also the directorial debut of Scott Frank.  Scott Frank who has been a screenwriter for many years, worked on some really great movies like “Get Shorty,”  “Minority Report,” and “Marley & Me.”  Scott Frank also wrote the screenplay of “The Lookout.”  I think he did a great job with being directing this piece.  As well as seeing a movie that was his own original story and not based off a source material, as most of his writing has been.

I am beyond happy to find this movie and watch it, but I would have not found this movie if it wasn’t for one person, film historian and film critic Leonard Maltin.  One day, I was watching his show “Secret’s Out,” which he reviews movies that might not have been mainstream, but very good gems that people should go out and see.  Anyways, on one of the episodes, he was giving his review on “The Lookout” and I was inspired enough to find the movie.  So thank you Leonard Maltin for recommending this gem.  And I will say that this will not be the last time I review a film that which Leonard Maltin recommends from his show. (Click the pic below to view the review)

Everyone should go find this movie and watch it.  It’s out on blu-ray and dvd right now.  You’ll love watching Joseph’s character go though this interesting depiction of an adventure. What I can’t understand is how this movie got overlooked with the reviews this film had gotten.  This movie gets my two thumbs up and in my opinion is a great 10 out of 10.  So what did I do today, I got up, took a shower, and watched “The Lookout,” again.