Jamie
If I had made a list of top 10 films we missed for BMT, The Loft would have been high up on it. Why? Exactly. Why, indeed. Why did they make a cliche thriller filled with TV actors? The promos for the film must have felt like a Jets-Bills game from the mid-2000’s. Marsden! Urban! Battle of the titans on Thursday Night Football. And to think Eric Stonestreet was in the middle of his Modern Family streak when he did this. Arguably he’s the biggest name in the film. Besides our boy Wentworth Miller. He’s a star in our eyes.
To recap, Karl Urban is a real piece of trash who happens to also be the hottest architect in New Orleans. He’s got a great group of friends, so why not share a creepy sex loft with them? Right? I mean, it’s only logical. His friends are mostly like “uh, what?” but inexplicably they all eventually agree that is makes sense to split this loft like a bunch of sex criminals. Obviously one day they find a dead woman there and they’re all like “what thuuuuu…” They point fingers at one another and we find out through flashbacks that they really are just garbage cans dressed in human clothes. One of them had an affair and now is a real saddo. The other fell in love with a prostitute and is a real saddo. The third is a big drug addict and is a real saddo. The fourth was already a saddo. The fifth was Karl Urban and wait a second! He’s not a saddo at all! In fact he seems quite satisfied with his weird sex condo! He must be the criminal! Doesn’t help that Wentworth Miller taped them all in the apartment like a creep and caught Urban sleeping with everyone they loved. Well that settles it, he killed the woman (almost forgot about her) and so let’s frame him for the murder he definitely committed. But wait, Marsen is a little suspicious. Some of this isn’t adding up. So he goes back to the loft and confronts to saddest saddo of them all (who’d ever suspect?!), Wentworth Miller. Turns out he was so sad that he decided to kill the girl and frame Urban cause… uh… Urban was the only thing that stood in the way of him being with the woman… who he just killed. Anyway, he then jumps from the balcony and six months later everyone is like “that was crazy, right?” THE END.
So yeah, the whole movie is trashy. It’s fun in a ridiculous way. Nothing totally makes sense in how a few of them get away with what would at the very least be obstruction of justice and at worst be a failed attempt to frame their friend for a murder he didn’t commit. And it’s that throw-caution-to-the-wind, who cares if it makes sense attitude that really puts this over the top in terms of BMT thrills and chills. Most films fall flat by overthinking things and ultimately overexplaining their convoluted noir-lite plot into mundanity. This gloriously underthinks its noir-ultra plot into BMT-ity.
Hot Take Clam Bake! The entire premise of the film is false! It’s set up like having a primo sex loft is every trash philanderers dream. No seedy motel receipts, they say. No fake work trips or calls from people wondering if they want you to drop off the handcuffs you left at their place, they explain. Everything your garbage heart desires is there at… The Loft. But guess what is even more suspicious than all that? Going fivesies on a high end loft in the 46th largest city in the United States. What’s that gonna run each of them? Ten grand? Ah yeah, sure is far less suspicious than a $125 hotel room for the zero nights you are actually going to cheat on your wives. This isn’t even a hot take. This whole film is an ice cold take. Hot Take Temperature: Salt & Vinegar.
Patrick
‘Ello everyone! The Loft? More like The Daft! Amirite? Hey guys, want to all get in on this sweet f-shack plan I got going. Don’t worry, it is in my incredibly conspicuous apartment building complete with a balcony overlooking the French Quarter of New Orleans. No? Let’s go!
- The plan is even more ludicrous than it sounds, and the motivation for Urban is completely impenetrable. He’s an incredibly rich architect who seemingly gets all of his “friends” in on an f-shack. But he, like, owns the place? So are they going five ways on the mortgage? The HOA fees? And these four other people, that money isn’t being noticed by any of their wives? Them disappearing randomly doesn’t arouse any suspicion? No one, not once, happens to notice Urban hanging on the balcony of that apartment and then later one of his friends (with a woman) and puts two and two together? Are they just like not using that balcony? SO MANY QUESTIONS!
- I put friends in quotes because one of the people is the half-criminal half-brother of one guy. Another is a borderline alcoholic who can’t keep his shit together. So … again, why are these the people you are choosing for your f-shack timeshare?
- The only thing that really makes sense is that Urban gets off on control, and the most extreme version of that is controlling his friends in a pact in which they’re all committing adultery, but also Urban is having sex with their wives or girlfriends or sisters and stuff in the same bed? But given what we see about him, his f-shack timeshare would have been put to much much better use as a transaction with the other high flying philanderers of the city. He truly is Icarus, flying too close to the sun with his weirdo plans.
- And then in the end only one person goes to prison for the murder? Yeah, not buying it. I have a feeling this is a “lost in translation” moment, but the four conspirators who seemingly fake-frame Urban (although Wentworth Miller secretly plans on for-real-framing him) ultimately kill someone. I’m pretty sure that in the end all four could be held responsible for negligent homicide as part of a felony murder (although reading up on it it is possible that that wouldn’t apply since they didn’t commit any other felony / that felony didn’t explicitly involve danger to life? It is possible this is also not the case in Louisiana). There are ways around it, but I just can’t imagine that once Marsden admitted to trying to frame Urban for murder and ultimately a woman dies in the process of that crime, that only the person who actually directly killed the woman would face serious consequences. That doesn’t seem right, but it is possible … I think I need to write into a law podcast to see what they think.
- I do kind of like the Setting as a Character (Where?) for New Orleans since it is more subtle than one would think, but is made explicit at one point in the film in which Marsden passes a sign pointing the way to the French Quarter. And a definite Worst Twist (How?) for ultimately it all being a frame up planned by Wentworth Miller that went horribly wrong. This is such a BMT film it is insane, we had an hours long discussion about how ludicrous this film is.
Read about the sneaky sequel The Loft 2: Penthouse in the Quiz. Cheerios,
The Sklogs
Bad Movie Twins 