"Greedy People" is like Coen Brothers-lite with a great cast

Greedy People (2024)

So much happens in director Potsy Ponciroli’s "Greedy People" that one almost forgets how it even began. In this darkly comedic crime farce of errors with a stacked ensemble, it does all begin with a police call gone wrong and an up-for-grabs stash of cash. It’s offbeat and mostly amusing, but the overly knotty crime plot just keeps shuffling around its quirky, bumbling small-town characters like pawns in body bags until it’s over.

"Greedy People" has the marks of a quintessential Coen Brothers picture, particularly "Fargo," but it actually might fit in more with 2000s-era black comedies like "Drowning Mona" and "The Ice Harvest." Not exactly a buddy-cop comedy, the film introduces us to a day in the life of two diametrically opposite cops. Officer Will Shelley (Himesh Patel) is new to the police force and to the small town of Providence, South Carolina, where he’s moved with his expectant wife, Paige (Lily James). During his first day on the job, he rides with cop Terry (Joseph Gordon-Levitt), a raunchy wild card who knows all of the best spots for a free cup of coffee. While Terry has a morning delight with his married girlfriend, Will sits in the police cruiser until answering a burglary call but gets the code wrong, leading to the accidental death of a local woman (Traci Lords). When Terry comes to the house, they happen upon a basket full of a million dollars. Of course, they take the money and try pinning the crime on someone else. More miscommunication and plot convolutions ensue.

The premise is simple—greed comes out in a bunch of characters when money is concerned—but the script by Mike Vukadinovich then keeps adding more complications, including other motives and perspectives from other characters (complete with chapters). They include the dead woman’s dim masseur/gigolo (Simon Rex); the dead woman’s husband, a shrimp company owner (Tim Blake Nelson), and his secretary sidepiece (Nina Arianda); a contract killer (Jim Gaffigan) known as The Irishman who leaves job listings on a tear-off flyer in a hardware store; and a Colombian hitman (José María Yazpik) who was actually hired by the husband to kill his wife. Through all of the cynical payoffs in the zigzagging crime plot is a Marge Gunderson-level moral center: a wonderful Uzo Aduba, as Will and Terry’s police captain Murphy, who’s still grieving the loss of her son. Read the full review at GuyAtTheMovies.com

Grade: C +

Lionsgate released "Greedy People" (113 min.) in select theaters and on demand on August 23, 2024.