The movie released on October 21, 2016 is about a defense attorney who worked to get his

teenage client acquitted of murdering his wealthy father.

Director was Courtney Hunt

Writer was Nicholas Kazan (as Rafael Jackson)
Keanu Reeves played defense attorney Richard Ramsay
Renee Zellwegger played Loretta Lassiter, Mike’s mother
Gugu Mbattha-Raw played younger lawyer Janelle Brady
Gabriel Basso played Michael Lassiter, a seventeen-year-old suspected of murdering his father
Jim Belushi played Boone Lassiter, Mike’s father
Jim Klock played Leblanc, the prosecutor who had a rock-solid case against the teen
Nicole Barre played Angela Morley
Ritchie Montgomery played the judge
Sean Bridgers played Arthur Westin
Christoper Berry played Jack Legrand
Dana Gourrier played courthouse employee

this is a story of workaday legal mechanics, not lofty jurisprudence.

As the movie deconstructs such core aspects of the system as jury selection and
attorneys’ theatrical maneuvers the effect is one of academic interest, not gripping
storytelling.

Everyone is clearly hiding something. But more pressing than the mystery of Mike’s
silence and his parents’ toxic relationship is the sense of a missed opportunity that
permeates the movie, sapping its final twist of the solar-plexus wallop it should have
delivered.

the first rule of innocence: never, ever light a ciggie

Someone killed Jim Belushi, Keanu Reeves is the dubious defence lawyer, and now
anxious mom Renée Zellweger is sending smoke signals

this one does seem like an open and shut case. The son’s fingerprints were found all over the knife.
Another murderer brought to justice by the great American legal system!

But this shot complicates everything. It’s Renée Zellweger. And look what she’s doing. She’s
smoking a cigarette – the universal cinematic symbol for classic untrustworthiness.

a violent sexual assault on Zellweger before he died.

Perhaps her son saw this, and this was his motive. Or perhaps it’s what spurred Zellweger on to
start sleeping with Keanu Reeves in order to convince him to stab Jim Belushi to
death, then frame her son for the murder, then defend her son so successfully in
court that he gets acquitted, which is very obviously how this bloody film is going to
end.

Here’s Zellweger Gone Girling herself with a pumice stone, in order to use the bruises as evidence
of Belushi’s violence.

And this is Renée Zellweger witnessing what definitely has to be Keanu Reeves stabbing Jim
Belushi to death on her say-so. She looks thrilled that her plan has come to fruition. Or she looks
scared. Or sad. Or angry. Or peckish. Honestly, it’s quite hard to tell these days.

the wait for a “Guilty” or “Not guilty” is the elemental fuel for the dramatic fire.

Richard Ramsay, who manages to exude the familiar alpha male lawyer persona in
a controlled (and, at times, subdued) way.

the procedural beats of Mike’s case and the details of the crime in question swallow
the film’s focus, little room remains for personality-driven touches that might
elevate this from being standard legal fare.

Most engaging are the wispy, fleeting glimpses that Hunt incorporates in a hazy, overheard
fashion. But those sequences that get the full-blown flashback treatment always double as blaring
clue sirens. As a result, these memories get assembled into a clear hierarchy that’s less
about how these memories work and more about establishing an explicit plot framework.

As Mike’s father, Jim Belushi shows he’s capable of playing the scumbaggery that makes him a
contemptible villain. But his character exists purely to be a foil, the film’s way of
establishing an outsized character to keep the audience looking one way before
jerking them back towards another.

But despite being saddled with being the surly, brooding teenager, the film’s standout is Gabriel
Basso, who lets just enough of Mike’s inner turmoil percolate at the surface. Silent for much of the
film, he takes elements of a familiar revenge tale and does everything in his power to rescue his
storyline from some murky ethical waters.

Defense attorney Richard Ramsay works on a tough case to defend 17-year-old Mike Lassiter
for the alleged murder of his wealthy Southern blowhard lawyer father Boone Lassiter. Ramsay,
being a good personal as well as professional friend of Boone, feels double pressure to gather
evidence to save Mike but finds it harder to do so as Mike completely stops talking after the
incident. Ramsay employs a young talented lawyer Janelle Brady, daughter of another
professional friend, as his assistant, after she left corporate law to pursue career in criminal
defense.

The first witness, a flight attendant for a charter flight, states that she witnessed certain tension
between father and son on a return journey from Stanford. In a flashback, its shown that Mike
wants to go to Reeds while Boone forces him to attend Stanford. The police officer who first
responded to the call testifies that at the scene of the crime, Mike muttered 'I should've done it
long ago', and she and the chief detective affirms that his fingerprints were found on the murder
weapon.

The Lassiters' neighbors testify that Mike was very close to Boone when he was young but
gradually grew distant in his teens and also report Boone's arrogant attitude towards his family
and neighbors. Series of flashbacks show Boone's various affairs and his bossy and belittling
behavior towards his wife, Loretta, both in public and private. Loretta testifies and confirms that
she had indeed endured emotional and physical abuse for years, including the day of his death.
She testifies that she went to take a shower after the fight and when she came back, she found
his dead body. She tearfully says that Mike admitted to her that he did it. Ramsay provides
pictures of her bruised body, taken a day after her husband's death, as an evidence of Boone's
cruelty towards her.

After that, Mike finally decides to talk and wants to take the stand to present his case and
threatens to fire Ramsey when he objects. He corroborates his mother's and neighbors' version
about his father's arrogance and cruelty, and suddenly admits to killing his father, not to save his
mother but to save himself as he was molested by his father since he was about 12. It stopped for
a while but his father resumed it on their flight back from Stanford and he killed him when he
again tried it on the day of his death.

Prosecution calls the flight attendant who first insists that nothing happened on the flight but
later, owing to tactful line of questioning by Janelle, and to cover up her extramarital affair with
the co-pilot, she admits that there's a chance that she spent too much time in cockpit to
confidently deny any unusual interaction between father and son. Janelle later gets suspicious
about Mike's story and meets Loretta outside the courtroom and gradually deduces that Mike has
taken blame on himself to protect Loretta. She confronts Ramsey but he says that his duty was to
save Mike, not to dwell deep into the case. She angrily leaves, making Ramsey worry about the
Jury's reaction to her absence, but she later decides to continue with the case.

Despite the lack of proper evidence of Boone's mistreatment of his son, the Jury decides to acquit
Mike. While waiting for his belongings in a private room, Mike confronts Ramsey, saying that he
saw Ramsey's watch lying beside his father's corpse, which was covertly removed by his mother
while she persuaded Mike to step away from the body. Mike says that he took blame to save his
mother but now, as he was certain of Ramsey's involvement, wants to restart the case. Ramsey
denies his suspicions and tells him that the case won't stand and it only hurts Mike's credibility.

Mike doesn't believe him but reluctantly decides not to pursue it for the lack of further evidence.
As they all leave the court house, Ramsey recalls the true events. He and Loretta were having an
affair and when Boone gets suspicious about his wife's infidelity, Ramsey advises him to divorce
her but Boone repeats what he always says- he'd kill her if she ever leaves him. He implies that he
knew it was Ramsey she was involved with but doesn't explicitly say anything about it. Loretta
and Ramsey conspire to kill him and present the case as self-defense on Loretta's part but Mike
comes home early and takes blame upon him before they could arrange the evidence and
confesses to detective that he committed the crime.

Most of the film took place mostly in the courtroom.

Mbatha-Raw had a totaly thankless role as Ramsey’s co-counsel.

Over the course of the trial was shown the dark side of Boone, a man who could be abusive with
both his wife and son.
As for motive, one could ask the following questions:
 Did Mike finally have enough of his abuse?
 Did he kill his father to protect his mother?
Ramsey had no idea how to go forward with the case because Mike hasn’t said a word about what
happened that day. It’s hinted at early on that Mike had an obsession with crime-solving, planting
the seed that perhaps there’s more going on than we may expect. And then the film employs a
flashback structure that kind of becomes its trick.
Ramsey tells us in overwritten narration—and to his co-counsel—that every witness lies. So we
see witness testimony that either omits something or flat-out lies, and then we see the truth
through flashback. Of course, it all culminates in several final act twists, the last of which makes
almost no sense at all.

Truth be told, Keanu Reeves and Renée Zellweger deserve better than this predictable
courtroom drama.

Instead of the open-and-shut case the prosecution called it to be, the film actually had so many
mysteries swirling around. Due to this, the relatively banal question of who murdered Boone
Lassiter is undoubtedly the least interesting. The cops already have their man, and the judge
wants a swift trial.

The movie was a weak legal procedural which is ironic a role for huge stars Keanu Reeves and
Renée Zellweger and Oscar nominated director Courtney Hunt.

 If Richard was Boone’s lawyer, and Boone is now dead, should he really be defending the No.
1 suspect?

 And why, if history has shown that wives are often responsible for such crimes, is no one
taking a closer look at Boone’s widow, Loretta (Zellweger), the doting mother/long-suffering
wife, whom evidence suggests may have been the victim of physical abuse and repeated
infidelity?
 Even the camera seems to be avoiding her, at least at first, as Zellweger appears discreetly
over Richard’s shoulder, fretfully attending her son’s trial, but getting suspiciously little screen
time for someone who surely knows more than she’s letting on.
 And then there’s the ludicrous detail of Mike’s silence: The young man refuses to utter a word
in his own defense, until the last minute, when he suddenly insists on taking the stand — a
 decision that makes Richard extremely nervous, as the lawyer has no idea what his client
might say.
 only energy hails from its agitated piano score; the resulting film feels like a missed
opportunity,
 the heavy narration by Reeves is a clue to someone’s attempt to simplify and reshuffle
things in the editing room
 volunteers the observation that “all witnesses lie” and proceeds to cast in doubt
everything that anybody says — a formula by which only the accused, who keeps his
mouth shut, seems above suspicion.
 Richard has his work cut out for him trying to defend Mike with no help from the young
man, and yet, he makes swift progress by painting his late friend Boone as an
overbearing monster, using cross-examination to present an image of someone who
got what was coming to him.

it’s kind of cheat that the witnesses’ testimony triggers cutaway scenes to Boone’s worst offenses,
from picking up loose women on business trips to embarrassing his son in front of
neighbors at a family barbecue, considering that those who take the stand offer milder or
downright conflicting accounts of the events being depicted.

it’s not really the jury that Richard is trying to convince here, but the audience, for whom
Mbatha-Raw’s character serves as proxy — the daughter of Richard’s mentor and a
promising young lawyer in her own right. She is perhaps the only truly decent character in
this whole mess, though even she has skeletons in her closet.

much of Richard’s defense has been crafted just for her benefit, and it’s sort of a letdown that
she doesn’t play a bigger part when everything starts to unravel.

Here, it feels as if anyone could have played these roles, and there’s something a little sad
about watching the ever-wooden Reeves and numb-looking Zellweger (convincing as a rich
man’s frail, if resourceful wife) settle for such shallow work, considering how much more
we know them to be capable of.

everything seems a bit too laid out for you to be shocked by the ultimate result of the
movie. Especially as any and all flashbacks are treated as a matter of fact and
not varying perceptions of what actually happened.

Though it is perhaps the ending which got me the most. What someone surely
considered a “big reveal” honestly felt thrown in there. It is like the writer
(Nicholas Kazan) crafted something which may have seen complex on paper
but in live action, it didn’t translate well. To the point that it almost leaves you
with a feeling of indifference, or the need to roll your eyes, for it seems someone
thought that reveal would be huge and yet it falls flat partly due to predictability.
Well, if I based it solely on this movie, I would say Reeves and Zellweger are
excellent actors.

 Be it how calm Loretta seems through all this,

 Mike’s proclamation and all signs to him being the murderer,

 or even Richard’s part in this. His willingness to take on an unproven lawyer, one
with issues, as his 2nd chair and then defend the kid who killed his former friend
and client?
 on top of that, drag Boone’s name through the mud?

There is so much here to question and if you don’t look past the surface you
could get lost. However, if you shake away the fog and don’t let the actors’ grip hold
onto you, everything seems clear and Janelle is surely to blame.

the actors get you early into a trance but the twist and would be shocks are
jolts to the system that aren’t introduced in a way that could keep you from
thinking “hold up, something is not right.”

They lead you too quickly to answers and being proved right too many times
leaves you feeling dissatisfied.

The attorney is resolute in his belief that trial witnesses are a bunch of lying liars.
Punching holes in their stories, however obliquely, is his only option when his client
won’t talk.

While Mike doodles and Ramsay assassinates the dead man’s character, widow
Loretta watches the proceedings in a state of seeming confusion and anxiety, with
Zellweger’s performance registering a jittery mix of disillusion, fear and trophy-wife
entitlement.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Whole_Truth_(2016_film)

The Whole Truth (2016 film)

A defense attorney works to get his teenage client acquitted of murdering his wealthy
father.
Director:
Courtney Hunt
Writer:
Nicholas Kazan (as Rafael Jackson)
Stars:
Keanu Reeves, Renée Zellweger, Gugu Mbatha-Raw | See full cast & crew »

The Whole Truth is a 2016 American thriller film directed by Courtney Hunt and
written by Nicholas Kazan. The film stars Keanu Reeves, Gabriel Basso, Gugu
Mbatha-Raw, Renée Zellweger, and Jim Belushi.
The film was released on October 21, 2016.

Plot[edit]
Defense attorney Richard Ramsay works on a tough case to defend 17-year-old
Mike Lassiter for the alleged murder of his wealthy lawyer father Boone Lassiter.
Ramsay, being a good personal as well as professional friend of Boone, feels double
pressure to gather evidence to save Mike but finds it harder to do so as Mike
completely stops talking after the incident. Ramsay employs a young talented lawyer
Janelle Brady, daughter of another professional friend, as his assistant, after she left
corporate law to pursue career in criminal defense.
The first witness, a flight attendant for a charter flight, states that she witnessed
certain tension between father and son on a return journey from Stanford. In a
flashback its shown that Mike wants to go to Reeds while Boone forces him to attend
Stanford. The police officer who first responded to the call testifies that at the scene
of the crime, Mike muttered 'I should've done it long ago', and she and the chief
detective affirms that his fingerprints were found on the murder weapon.
The Lassiters' neighbors testify that Mike was very close to Boone when he was young
but gradually grew distant in his teens and also report Boone's arrogant attitude
towards his family and neighbors. Series of flashbacks show Boone's various affairs
and his bossy and belittling behavior towards his wife, Loretta, both in public and
private. Loretta testifies and confirms that she had indeed endured emotional and
physical abuse for years, including the day of his death. She testifies that she went to
take a shower after the fight and when she came back, she found his dead body. She
tearfully says that Mike admitted to her that he did it. Ramsay provides pictures of
her bruised body, taken a day after her husband's death, as an evidence of Boone's
cruelty towards her.
After that, Mike finally decides to talk and wants to take the stand to present his
case and threatens to fire Ramsey when he objects. He corroborates his mother's and
neighbors' version about his father's arrogance and cruelty, and suddenly admits to
killing his father, not to save his mother but to save himself as he was molested by
his father since he was about 12. It stopped for a while but his father resumed it on
their flight back from Stanford and he killed him when he again tried it on the day
of his death.
Prosecution calls the flight attendant who first insists that nothing happened on the
flight but later, owing to tactful line of questioning by Janelle, and to cover up her
extramarital affair with the co-pilot, she admits that there's a chance that she spent
too much time in cockpit to confidently deny any unusual interaction between father
and son. Janelle later gets suspicious about Mike's story and meets Loretta outside
the courtroom and gradually deduces that Mike has taken blame on himself to
protect Loretta. She confronts Ramsey but he says that his duty was to save Mike,
not to dwell deep into the case. She angrily leaves, making Ramsey worry about the
Jury's reaction to her absence, but she later decides to continue with the case.
Despite the lack of proper evidence of Boone's mistreatment of his son, the Jury
decides to acquit Mike. While waiting for his belongings in a private room, Mike
confronts Ramsey, saying that he saw Ramsey's watch lying beside his father's
corpse, which was covertly removed by his mother while she persuaded Mike to step
away from the body. Mike says that he took blame to save his mother but now, as he
was certain of Ramsey's involvement, wants to restart the case. Ramsey denies his
suspicions and tells him that the case won't stand and it only hurts Mike's credibility.
Mike doesn't believe him but reluctantly decides not to pursue it for the lack of
further evidence. As they all leave the court house, Ramsey recalls the true events. He
and Loretta were having an affair and when Boone gets suspicious about his wife's
infidelity, Ramsey advises him to divorce her but Boone repeats what he always
says- he'd kill her if she ever leaves him. He implies that he knew it was Ramsey she
was involved with but doesn't explicitly say anything about it. Loretta and Ramsey
conspire to kill him and present the case as self-defense on Loretta's part but Mike
comes home early and takes blame upon him before they could arrange the evidence
and confesses to detective that he committed the crime.
Cast[edit]
 Keanu Reeves as Richard Ramsay, a defense attorney

 Renée Zellweger as Loretta Lassiter, Mike's mother

 Gugu Mbatha-Raw as Janelle Brady, a younger lawyer

 Gabriel Basso as Mike Lassiter, a seventeen-year-old suspected of murdering

his father

 Jim Belushi as Boone Lassiter, Mike's father[2]

 Jim Klock as Leblanc, the prosecutor[3]

 Sean Bridgers as Arthur Westin

 Christopher Berry as Jack Legrand

 Dana Gourrier as courthouse employee

Production[edit]
Daniel Craig was originally set to star since January 2014. In April, just a few days
before filming was set to commence, he dropped out of the project for unknown
reasons.[4] Craig was replaced by Keanu Reeves in June.
On July 10, 2014, Jim Belushi joined the cast of the film to play Mike's father, and
Zellweger would play his mother.[2] On August 12, Jim Klock was added to the cast
to play the prosecutor, who has a rock-solid case against the teen.[3]
Filming[edit]
Principal photography of the film began on July 7, 2014, in New
Orleans, Louisiana.[5][2] Previously the filming was slated to take place in Boston.[6]
References[edit]
1. ^ "THE WHOLE TRUTH (15)". British Board of Film Classification. March 24,
2016. Retrieved March 25, 2016.

2. ^ Jump up to:a b c Ge, Linda (July 10, 2014). "Jim Belushi Joins Keanu Reeves,
Renee Zellweger in Courtney Hunt's 'The Whole Truth'". thewrap.com.
Retrieved July 11, 2014.

3. ^ Jump up to:a b "Jim Klock Joins 'The Whole Truth'". deadline.com. August 12,
2014. Retrieved August 13, 2014.

4. ^ "Daniel Craig Abruptly Drops Out of 'The Whole Truth'". deadline. August 4,
2014. Retrieved October 4, 2014.

5. ^ "ON THE SET FOR 7/07/14: Owen Wilson & Kristen Wiff start relativity
armored car project, Mel Gibson wraps on Blood Father".
studiosystemnews.com. July 7, 2014. Retrieved July 11, 2014.
 6. ^ Banks, Paul (July 2, 2014). "New Orleans courts The Whole Truth". kftv.com.
Retrieved July 14, 2014.

External links[edit]
 The Whole Truth on IMDb

 The Whole Truth at Rotten Tomatoes

https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_whole_truth_2016

Defense attorney Richard Ramsay (Keanu Reeves) takes on a personal case when he
swears to his widowed friend, Loretta Lassiter (Renée Zellweger), that he will keep
her son Mike (Gabriel Basso) out of prison. Charged with murdering his father, Mike
initially confesses to the crime. But as the trial proceeds, chilling evidence about the
kind of man that Boone Lassiter (Jim Belushi) really was comes to light. While
Ramsay uses the evidence to get his client acquitted, his new colleague Janelle (Gugu
Mbatha-Raw) tries to dig deeper - and begins to realize that the whole truth is
something she alone can uncover.

https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/the-whole-truth-2016

“The Whole Truth” opens in the courtroom in which most of the film will take place. We meet an
attorney named Ramsey (Reeves), defending an old family friend named Mike (Gabriel Basso),
who has been accused of murdering his father Boone (Belushi). When the police arrived on the
scene, Mike was crouching over his father’s body, there’s a palm print on the knife that looks like
his, and he arguably made a confession. He’s been silent ever since. Zellweger plays Mike’s mother;
Mbatha-Raw gets a totally thankless role as Ramsey’s co-counsel.
Over the course of the trial, we learn about the dark side of Boone, a man who could be abusive
with both his wife and son. Did Mike finally have enough of his abuse? Did he kill his father to
protect his mother? Ramsey has no idea because Mike hasn’t said a word about what happened
that day. It’s hinted at early on that Mike had an obsession with crime-solving, planting the seed
that perhaps there’s more going on than we may expect. And then the film employs a flashback
structure that kind of becomes its trick. Ramsey tells us in overwritten narration—and to his co-
counsel—that every witness lies. So we see witness testimony that either omits something or flat-
out lies, and then we see the truth through flashback. Of course, it all culminates in several final act
twists, the last of which makes almost no sense at all.
“The Whole Truth” is filled with lines out of the Grisham playbook (like “They don’t teach this in
law school”) and your enjoyment may come down to how much you’re willing to forgive for the
sake of a legal mystery. There’s a whole genre of mass-market paperbacks—I used to call them
“airport books”—that work perfectly on a beach or a long flight, when one’s bullshit detector
somehow becomes dulled. The script for “The Whole Truth” is an “airport book,” although it
contains even less sizzle and grit than most of those. It's by-the-numbers.

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt3503406/plotsummary

A defense attorney works to get his teenage client acquitted of murdering his wealthy
father.
—Anonymous
Defense attorney Richard Ramsay takes on a personal case when he swears to his
widowed friend, Loretta Lassiter, that he will keep her son Mike out of prison.
Charged with murdering his father, Mike initially confesses to the crime. But as the
trial proceeds, chilling evidence about the kind of man that Boone Lassiter really was
comes to light. While Ramsay uses the evidence to get his client acquitted, his new
colleague Janelle tries to dig deeper - and begins to realize that the whole truth is
something she alone can uncover.
—Lionsgate Premiere

https://variety.com/2016/film/reviews/the-whole-truth-review-1201890774/

Truth’

Truth be told, Keanu Reeves and Renée Zellweger deserve better than this predictable
courtroom drama.

There are so many mysteries swirling around the otherwise open-shut courtroom drama “The
Whole Truth” that the relatively banal question of who murdered Boone Lassiter is undoubtedly the
least interesting. The cops already have their man, and the judge wants a swift trial. Meanwhile,
audiences might well ask, what was it that turn-of-the-millennium stars Keanu Reeves and Renée
Zellweger saw in this material, which plays like a rejected episode of “Law & Order: SVU”? Or,
equally intriguing, why did promising “Frozen River” helmer Courtney Hunt (who spent some of the
eight-year span since her impressive indie debut directing episodes of “Law & Order: SVU”)
choose to go back to the big screen with such a weak legal procedural?

Reeves plays Richard Ramsay, family lawyer and longtime personal friend to the late Boone
Lassiter (Jim Belushi), a rich Southern blowhard found stabbed to death in his bedroom. When the
cops arrived at the scene, Boone’s teenage son Mike (Gabriel Basso), by all reports a promising
college-bound kid, was kneeling beside the body and said something to the officers that sounded
like a confession. Mike hasn’t spoken since, but he’s on trial for the murder, and it’s Richard’s job
to get him off, despite what seems like overwhelming evidence to suggest that Mike killed his
father.

Already there’s something fishy in this arrangement: If Richard was Boone’s lawyer, and Boone is
now dead, should he really be defending the No. 1 suspect? And why, if history has shown that
wives are often responsible for such crimes, is no one taking a closer look at Boone’s widow,
Loretta (Zellweger), whom evidence suggests may have been the victim of physical abuse and
repeated infidelity? Even the camera seems to be avoiding her, at least at first, as Zellweger
appears discreetly over Richard’s shoulder, fretfully attending her son’s trial, but getting
suspiciously little screen time for someone who surely knows more than she’s letting on. And then
there’s the ludicrous detail of Mike’s silence: The young man refuses to utter a word in his own
defense, until the last minute, when he suddenly insists on taking the stand — a decision that
makes Richard extremely nervous, as the lawyer has no idea what his client might say.

Viewers who’ve spent any time watching TV courtroom dramas will probably believe they’ve
figured out “The Whole Truth” from practically its opening scene, and despite a few minor twists
along the way, chances are, they have. The real mystery is what this script must have contained
that didn’t make it onto the screen, because at a meager 93 minutes, “The Whole Truth” feels like
a fraction of some larger, more ambitious project, one in which certain roles — such as the doting
mother/long-suffering wife played by Zellweger, or the conflicted young legal aide (Gugu Mbatha-
Raw) who joins Richard’s team — surely contributed additional color to this drab-looking drama,
whose only energy hails from its agitated piano score. Certainly, the heavy narration by
Reeves is a clue to someone’s attempt to simplify and reshuffle things in the editing room.

Whatever the explanation, the resulting film feels like a missed opportunity, one that
volunteers the observation that “all witnesses lie” and proceeds to cast in doubt everything
that anybody says — a formula by which only the accused, who keeps his mouth shut,
seems above suspicion. Meanwhile, Richard has his work cut out for him trying to defend
Mike with no help from the young man, and yet, he makes swift progress by painting his
late friend Boone as an overbearing monster, using cross-examination to present an image
of someone who got what was coming to him.

It’s kind of cheat that the witnesses’ testimony triggers cutaway scenes to Boone’s worst offenses,
from picking up loose women on business trips to embarrassing his son in front of
neighbors at a family barbecue, considering that those who take the stand offer milder or
downright conflicting accounts of the events being depicted. Of course, it’s not really the jury
that Richard is trying to convince here, but the audience, for whom Mbatha-Raw’s character
serves as proxy — the daughter of Richard’s mentor and a promising young lawyer in her
own right. She is perhaps the only truly decent character in this whole mess, though even
she has skeletons in her closet. At any rate, much of Richard’s defense has been crafted just
for her benefit, and it’s sort of a letdown that she doesn’t play a bigger part when
everything starts to unravel.

Looking back to “Frozen River,” Hunt’s long-awaited second feature shares the weaknesses of her
debut — namely, a single-minded focus on a somewhat trashy predicament, with little to no
room for subplots or other enriching details — while lacking in the earlier film’s strengths. Missing
is the gritty suspense and vivid local color, not to mention a central performance as
compelling as Melissa Leo’s tooth-and-nail turn. Here, it feels as if anyone could have played
these roles, and there’s something a little sad about watching the ever-wooden Reeves and
numb-looking Zellweger (convincing as a rich man’s frail, if resourceful wife) settle for such
shallow work, considering how much more we know them to be capable of. These two
actors were at the top of their game 15 years ago, and though they each comes with certain
baggage, truth be told, they deserve better.
https://wherever-i-look.com/movies/the-whole-truth-overview-review-with-spoilers

The Whole Truth – Overview/ Review (with Spoilers)

By
Amari Allah
-
November 21, 2016

62.67% (3)

As a viewer, you always on the outside looking in, trying to guess what is
going to happen, and sometimes being relieved when right or displeased you
figured out the plot. Despite which side you fall on, one thing is for sure: you’ll
definitely find something praiseworthy about The Whole Truth.

Trigger Warning(s):
Blood | Conversation about Rape | Depiction of Verbal and Physical Abuse

Characters Worth Noting

Mike (Gabriel Basso) | Loretta (Renée Zellweger) | Richard Ramsey (Keanu Reeves) |
Janelle (Gugu Mbatha-Raw) | Boone (Jim Belushi)

Main Storyline

The sole focus of Ramsey is to find a way to get Mike a not guilty verdict. This is
despite all evidence and the entire investigation solely focusing on him killing his
father Boone. Someone who doesn’t have the best reputation. There are allegations
of physical abuse, there are multiple instances of verbal abuse, and Ramsey
tries to make him out to be a womanizer. But is that enough to justify a murder?
Does Mike’s silence for most of the trial make him seem less of a sympathetic figure?
Does Janelle’s grilling of a woman named Angela Morley (Nicole Barré), who may
have allowed Boone to do something unthinkable, help this slightly fishy case? Well…

{Commentary}

Something about this film reminds me of Anna (Mindscape) in the sense that you get
some real quality performances here but, unlike Mindscape, there is less of a
whodunit type of mystery here. The mind automatically gravitates to Mike’s
motive seeming off, especially as we are told he is a legal prodigy who for some
reason ended up on trial for murder. On top of that, Richard tells Janelle
everyone lies and Janelle keeps picking at that. It gets her some headway
during the trial, but even with her past used to attempt to discredit her, everything
seems a bit too laid out for you to be shocked by the ultimate result of the movie.
Especially as any and all flashbacks are treated as a matter of fact and not
varying perceptions of what actually happened.
Though it is perhaps the ending which got me the most. What someone surely
considered a “big reveal” honestly felt thrown in there. It is like the writer
(Nicholas Kazan) crafted something which may have seen complex on paper
but in live action, it didn’t translate well. To the point that it almost leaves you
with a feeling of indifference, or the need to roll your eyes, for it seems someone
thought that reveal would be huge and yet it falls flat partly due to predictability.

I can’t make a claim to being a fan of any actor in this movie, besides Gugu Mbatha-
Raw, and while I knew of the actors for their other roles, Bill & Ted and of
course Bridget’s Diary, I didn’t have a formed opinion. Well, if I based it solely on
this movie, I would say Reeves and Zellweger are excellent actors. To me,
there are only a few different types of actors and I would argue these two, at least in
this movie, seem like those who can take a decent script and, make it possibly
seem good thanks solely to their performances.

For the actors in this film, if you lend yourself to doubt anything, they will try to
quickly hook onto you and drag you toward the darkness. Be it how calm Loretta
seems through all this, Mike’s proclamation and all signs to him being the murderer,
or even Richard’s part in this. His willingness to take on an unproven lawyer, one with
issues, as his 2nd chair and then defend the kid who killed his former friend and
client? Then, on top of that, drag Boone’s name through the mud? There is so much
here to question and if you don’t look past the surface you could get lost.
However, if you shake away the fog and don’t let the actors’ grip hold onto you,
everything seems clear and Janelle is surely to blame.

Low Points

I am not the master in figuring out plots and getting twists and turns before they
happen. Even with all the TV shows and movies I watch, including foreign films and
anime, which can be quite screwed up, I find myself with wrong theories and
perceptions all the time. So when I do get something right, it is a bit
disappointing. Movies are fantasies, people actively trying to trick you into
forgetting the actor and only recognizing the character. There is this attempt to
bring a story, either inspired or fictional, to life and to get you lost in it.
Unfortunately, as noted, even when an actor is at their best, when there are red flags
it is hard to stay in the dream. When things seem off and don’t belong, the trance the
actors try to keep you in wears off and so comes you seeing flaws.

And that trance is important. In the best films, that trance is only broken once the
credits role. Yet, if the trance is broken earlier, it’s like watching a ballet in the
front row. Yes, you may physically see the artistry and perhaps admire it, but with
the sound of feet landing you find a nagging flaw that leads your mind to be a bit too
active in the pursuit of taking note of everything around you.

Bringing it back to this film, and to summarize, the actors get you early into a
trance but the twist and would be shocks are jolts to the system that aren’t
introduced in a way that could keep you from thinking “hold up, something is
not right.” They wake you up and lead you to question things, and not in a good
way. They lead you too quickly to answers and being proved right too many
times leaves you feeling dissatisfied.
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/review/whole-truth-937418

Keanu Reeves is a Louisiana attorney and Renee Zellweger the mother of his
noncommunicative client in a courtroom drama directed by Courtney Hunt.

Everybody lies. For Richard Ramsay, a lawyer defending an uncooperative murder

suspect in The Whole Truth, this is the only truth. It drives the legal strategy he
walks us through, in impassive voice over narration, in what might have been a
tantalizing whodunit about the less-than-gleaming gears of justice but is instead a
curiously uninvolving exercise in procedure.

Rather than tightening the screws and getting the blood pumping, director Courtney
Hunt allows the viewer ample time to contemplate why Renee Zellweger’s
unrecognizability has become politicized, why Keanu Reeves doesn’t do more comedy
and why a drama toplined by two marquee names is slipping into theaters, with a
simultaneous VOD release, virtually unannounced.

The answer to the last question is the flat melodrama that Hunt has wrung from a
screenplay credited to Rafael Jackson. The filmmaker’s second feature, after
2008’s Frozen River, is set and filmed in Louisiana’s St. Bernard Parish, near New
Orleans. It evokes the region’s clinging humidity, but with none of the urgency or
narrative power of the earlier film’s frigid New York setting. Amid the story’s lurid
peeks behind showy wealth to domestic horrors and marital secrets, the characters
barely come to life. Nerve-pinching musical notes and venetian blind shadows don’t
churn up even a modicum of noirish suspense.

Reeves’ motorcycle-driving Ramsay first appears as a grimace behind shades,

arriving at the courthouse to defend a high school student in an open-and-shut case
of patricide. The murdered man, Boone Lassiter (Jim Belushi), was a hotshot lawyer
and Ramsay’s friend. Lassiter’s teenage son, Mike (Gabriel Basso), has confessed to
the fatal stabbing, and now leaves Ramsay hamstrung by his refusal to discuss the
matter. The attorney is resolute in his belief that trial witnesses are a bunch of lying
liars. Punching holes in their stories, however obliquely, is his only option when his
client won’t talk. While Mike doodles and Ramsay assassinates the dead man’s
character, widow Loretta watches the proceedings in a state of seeming confusion
and anxiety, with Zellweger’s performance registering a jittery mix of disillusion, fear
and trophy-wife entitlement.
That the judge (Ritchie Montgomery) appreciates a swift trial is duly noted; this is a
story of workaday legal mechanics, not lofty jurisprudence. Hunt’s interest in the
strategic details of criminal-trial culture gives the film a matter-of-fact
verisimilitude, if not a pulse. (The director, who has a law degree, has helmed
episodes of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, and producer Elon Dershowitz is the
son of attorney Alan Dershowitz.) As the movie deconstructs such core aspects of the
system as jury selection and attorneys’ theatrical maneuvers — matters handled with
flair and intensity in The People v. O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story, to cite an
extraordinary recent example — the effect is one of academic interest, not gripping
storytelling.

Lending a bit of oomph is the arrival of Ramsay’s new junior colleague, Janelle Brady
(Gugu Mbatha-Raw), just in time to provide helpful optics in the courtroom; she’s
what Ramsay calls “mixed-race window dressing.” But Janelle gets a shot in the
spotlight, proving her chops with an ingenious cross-examination of a character
witness. And, Reeves’ wooden line readings notwithstanding, there are flashes of
intriguing tension between him and Mbatha-Raw, a compelling performer who
remains underused since her eye-catching turns in Belle and Beyond the Lights.
Janelle’s personal baggage, the unhappy facts coolly elicited by her new boss, proves
more engrossing than the Lassiters’ sordid saga, which is revealed in eleventh-hour
testimony and flashbacks to the villainous Boone’s poisonous interactions with his
family.

Everyone is clearly hiding something. But more pressing than the mystery of Mike’s
silence and his parents’ toxic relationship is the sense of a missed opportunity that
permeates the movie, sapping its final twist of the solar-plexus wallop it should have
delivered.

Distributor: Lionsgate Premiere

Production companies: PalmStar Media Capital presents, in association with
FilmNation Entertainment and Merced Finance, a Likely Story production, in
association with Atlas Entertainment, in association with PalmStar Entertainment,
Merced Media Partners, Nechamka Productions
Cast: Keanu Reeves, Renee Zellweger, Gugu Mbatha-Raw, Gabriel Basso, Jim Belushi,
Jim Klock, Ritchie Montgomery
Director: Courtney Hunt
Screenwriter: Rafael Jackson
Producers: Anthony Bregman, Kevin Frakes, Elon Dershowitz, Raj Brinder Singh
Executive producers: Gideon Tadmor, Eyal Rimmon, Buddy Patrick, Scott Fisher,
Jamin O’Brien, Stuart Brown, Vishal Rungta, Nicholas Kazan
Director of photography: Jules O’Loughlin
Production designer: Mara Lepere-Schloop
Costume designer: Abby O’Sullivan
Editor: Kate Williams
Composers: Evgueni and Sascha Galperine
Casting: Mary Vernieu, Lindsay Graham

https://www.theguardian.com/film/filmblog/2016/oct/04/the-whole-truth-trailer-review-
renee-zellweger-keanu-reeves

Film
The Whole Truth trailer – the first rule of innocence: never, ever light a ciggie
Someone killed Jim Belushi, Keanu Reeves is the dubious defence lawyer, and now
anxious mom Renée Zellweger is sending smoke signals

It’s hard to know what to think about The Whole Truth. On one hand, it’s a terse legal thriller
directed by an Oscar-nominated writer and featuring a clutch of household names.

But on the other hand, it’s a legal thriller called The Whole Truth; a title so drab that it looks
forever destined to languish unwatched on Netflix.

Fortunately, a trailer now exists for The Whole Truth. Maybe – just maybe – it’ll contain just
enough information to help you to decide whether to see it or not.

We open on a sweltering courtroom straight out of To Kill a Mockingbird. The defence lawyer?
Keanu Reeves. His colleague? Gugu Mbatha-Raw. That oddly familiar woman in the background
who looks a bit like what a child would hand you if you asked them to draw you a picture of Renée
Zellweger, even though they didn’t really know who Renée Zellweger was? Renée Zellweger.

And this is her son, the defendant. He’s been accused of a terrible, terrible crime. That crime?

Stabbing Jim Belushi to death. This, of course, widens the net of suspects from Renée Zellweger’s
son to anybody who has ever seen the sitcom According to Jim.
However, to be fair, this one does seem like an open and shut case. The son’s fingerprints were
found all over the knife. Another murderer brought to justice by the great American legal system!

But this shot complicates everything. It’s Renée Zellweger. And look what she’s doing. She’s
smoking a cigarette – the universal cinematic symbol for classic untrustworthiness.
Maybe her kid didn’t kill Jim Belushi after all! Then again, I could be misreading this shot. From
looking at it, it seems just as likely that this is an unsanctioned closeup of Renée Zellweger’s
Saddam Hussein-style body double trying to eat a lit cigarette for a dare. Quite frankly, it could
easily be either one.

Don’t let that make you think that Jim Belushi was an innocent victim, though. Here he is
committing a violent sexual assault on Zellweger before he died. Perhaps her son saw this,
and this was his motive. Or perhaps it’s what spurred Zellweger on to start sleeping with Keanu
Reeves in order to convince him to stab Jim Belushi to death, then frame her son for
the murder, then defend her son so successfully in court that he gets acquitted,
which is very obviously how this bloody film is going to end.

See? Here’s Zellweger Gone Girling herself with a pumice stone, in order to use the bruises as
evidence of Belushi’s violence.

And this is Renée Zellweger witnessing what definitely has to be Keanu Reeves stabbing Jim
Belushi to death on her say-so. She looks thrilled that her plan has come to fruition. Or she looks
scared. Or sad. Or angry. Or peckish. Honestly, it’s quite hard to tell these days.

Here’s the trailer’s big shot of Keanu Reeves walking into court to attempt to acquit
someone else of a murder that he definitely committed, because of course he did, because
the trailer has managed to give the entire plot of the story away so carelessly that even a child
could figure out how it ends, and this is why nobody will ever watch the actual film on Netflix or
anywhere else. Maybe this is why he looks so queasy.

The trailer ends with Zellweger’s son pushing Reeves against a vending machine. “Why did you
kill my dad and set me up?” the son growls. “Because I thought the trailer wouldn’t telegraph
the ending of the film this clearly!” Reeves stammered. “Of course it would! Why else do you think
Daniel Craig dropped out of the role at the last minute? It’s because he knew that the trailer was
going to sabotage the entire movie! He’s smart, Reeves, not like you.” “Not like me,” Reeves
murmurs in agreement.

https://www.indiewire.com/2016/10/the-whole-truth-review-keanu-reeves-renee-zellweger-
1201738923/

‘The Whole Truth’ Review: Keanu Reeves Does His Best in the Middle of Misdirection

The cast shows flashes of brilliance, but gets lost trying to shrug off the expectations
of courtroom conventions.

Steve Greene
Oct 21, 2016 4:18 pm
@stevebruin


Regardless of the medium, courtroom stories are inherently tethered to their verdict. While some
of these dramas foreground character nuance or an indictment of the justice system, the wait for
a “Guilty” or “Not guilty” is the elemental fuel for the dramatic fire. “The Whole Truth,”
the latest from “Frozen River” director Courtney Hunt, preserves that innocence binary for
the people who populate its story. The overbearing father, the brash attorney, the
misunderstood son, the junior litigator: all exist on clearly defined ends of the spectrum. The result
is a film that often avoids any middle ground, making for a cut-and-dried courtroom tale that
desperately wants to be anything but.
The earliest hope that “The Whole Truth” might find a path to transcending the familiar “Law &
Order” rhythms is Keanu Reeves’ turn as Richard Ramsay, who manages to exude the
familiar alpha male lawyer persona in a controlled (and, at times, subdued) way.
Ramsay’s client is young Mike Lasseter (Gabriel Basso), a sullen teenager on trial for the murder of
his loathsome father (Jim Belushi).

To the initial chagrin of Mike’s mother Loretta (Renée Zellweger), Ramsay takes on another
member of the defense team. Janelle Brady (Gugu Mbatha-Raw) comes equipped with her own
redemption arc, in the shadow of her successful lawyer father. The initial parrying between Janelle
and Ramsay as they suss out each other’s personal and professional style adds a much-needed
dose of levity. But as the procedural beats of Mike’s case and the details of the crime in
question swallow the film’s focus, little room remains for personality-driven touches
that might elevate this from being standard legal fare.

Though Rafael Jackson’s script takes time to include testimony from everyone on the
conspicuously small witness list, most of the relevant details come from flashback
sequences outside the courtroom. Most engaging are the wispy, fleeting glimpses that Hunt
incorporates in a hazy, overheard fashion. But those sequences that get the full-blown flashback
treatment always double as blaring clue sirens. As a result, these memories get assembled
into a clear hierarchy that’s less about how these memories work and more about
establishing an explicit plot framework.
This, in turn, does few favors for the cast of “The Whole Truth.” As Mike’s father, Jim Belushi
shows he’s capable of playing the scumbaggery that makes him a contemptible villain. But his
character exists purely to be a foil, the film’s way of establishing an outsized
character to keep the audience looking one way before jerking them back towards
another.
Janelle’s backstory (which, as described by her, sounds like a much darker version of the CW’s
most critically adored show) is disregarded as quickly as she serves her purpose to the case. But
despite being saddled with being the surly, brooding teenager, the film’s standout is Gabriel Basso,
who lets just enough of Mike’s inner turmoil percolate at the surface. Silent for much of the film,
he takes elements of a familiar revenge tale and does everything in his power to rescue his storyline
from some murky ethical waters.

Courtney Hunt’s debut film “Frozen River” took advantage of its Canadian border setting, weaving
it into the fabric of the film’s immigration tale. Here, there are few nods to the courthouse’s
Louisiana environs outside of some very loud crickets. When most of the film takes place on a
 private plane and in the backyard of a mansion, there aren’t many chances to pull back beyond
amped-up suburban angst.

And while the natural lighting of the courthouse and the relative patient pace of the testimony
might hint a more organic approach to this kind of drama, there’s still a stifling air of inevitability
to that flashback structure. Regardless of the culprit or the jury’s verdict, it’s never in doubt that
the “real” story will be revealed in due time. There might be momentary meditations on the nature
of truth, but once it’s apparent that this tale is hurtling towards an unambiguous conclusion, it
zaps the story of any tactical entertainment value.
The film’s closing minutes offer some parting pieces of information that upend some previously
laid assumptions, but it’s a grafted-on coda rather than a well-choreographed gut punch. Missing
from that protracted epilogue? Ramsay’s intermittent voice over, which occasionally surfaces
throughout the movie to hammer home character details that were already apparent. It’s telling
that the only time it pulls back is when there’s nothing left to say.

https://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/21/movies/the-whole-truth-review.html

Review: ‘The Whole Truth,’ or a Slimmed-Down Version of It

The Whole Truth

Directed by Courtney Hunt

Crime, Drama, Mystery, Thriller

R
1h 33m
By Jeannette Catsoulis
 Oct. 20, 2016

After a screening of “The Whole Truth,” a colleague remarked that it looked like a major studio
release that had been tweaked to within an inch of its life, leaving only a sliver of the movie that
might have been. How else to explain the involvement of two household-name stars (Keanu Reeves
and Renée Zellweger) and an award-winning director (Courtney Hunt) in a plot so soulless and
poorly dramatized that even the last-minute reveal is a yawn?

Our unreliable narrator is Richard Ramsay (Mr. Reeves), a cynical Louisiana lawyer whose teenage
client, Mike (Gabriel Basso), has apparently confessed to murdering his wealthy father. That’s
convenient for his mother, Loretta (Ms. Zellweger), a twitchy dame who clearly knows more than
she’s letting on. As revealed in singularly unexciting flashbacks, the deceased (Jim Belushi) was a
boor and a bully whose sins might not have stopped at serial adultery. But Mike isn’t talking — to
anyone.

Trundling along on the drone of Ramsay’s pseudo-hardboiled voice-over, “The Whole Truth” plays
like an especially claustrophobic courtroom procedural, drably photographed and generically
framed. Ms. Hunt, who has a law degree, made a strong feature debut in 2008 with the blue-collar
drama, “Frozen River,” a movie that burned with the intensity of Melissa Leo’s lead performance.
But neither Mr. Reeves nor his co-star is given the same opportunity to shine in a script (by Rafael
Jackson) that feels whittled to the bone.
This sense of narrative ellipses is nowhere more evident than in the character of Janelle (Gugu
Mbatha-Raw), a young lawyer with a romantic-stalker background that’s confided then simply
abandoned. Given her lovely work in the 2014 romance “Beyond the Lights,” Ms. Mbatha-Raw
seems more than capable of making Janelle both Ramsay’s nemesis and the movie’s savior.