'The Judge' makes a mess of Downey and Duvall

Teaming Robert Duvall and Robert Downey Jr. on the big screen presents all sorts of tantalizing possibilities. A new consigliere for Stark Industries? A cross-generational oater, with an ornery coot and his yappity sidekick riding into the sunset, saddlebags loaded with loot?

One possibility, however, arrives pretty much with the life squeezed out if it: The Judge. In this shaggy amalgam of legal thriller and domestic melodrama, Duvall plays the father, a respected small-town magistrate, to Downey's son, a slick city lawyer who can get even the most culpable of clients off the hook, fast-talking his way through loopholes.

Of course, Joseph Palmer (Duvall) and Hank Palmer (Downey) are estranged. And, of course, they work out their issues in a courtroom, with Judge Palmer on the witness stand, accused of murder, and Hank at the defense table, trying to convince the jury that his dad didn't do it. They might as well be sitting in a therapist's office: Why did you never show me any love? How could you up and leave? Do I blame you for that tragedy that happened way back when? You bet.

Directed in multitasking mode by David Dobkin, The Judge is a less-than-taut and crowded affair. When Hank is called back to hometown Carlinville, Ind., for the funeral of his mother, he leaves behind a young daughter (Emma Tremblay), to whom he is close, and a trophy wife (Sarah Lancaster), to whom he is not. In fact, she wants a divorce.

Tooling his luxury rental car into the sleepy burg where he grew up, Hank has to make peace with his siblings. Vincent D'Onofrio is the devoted lug of a brother; Jeremy Strong is the autistic one, documenting everything on an old Super 8 movie camera.

Hank must contend with an old flame (Vera Farmiga, blond, tattooed, ill-served by the script). And there's a wide-eyed young barkeep (Leighton Meester) that he should know better than to fool around with. And there is Billy Bob Thornton, as the prosecutor who has had enough of this nonsense. He's going to convict old man Palmer for running down a townie the judge didn't like, and he's going to show this sharp-suited Chicago counselor how real law is done.

The Judge is a tale of family dysfunction, the sins of the father and all that. It's about a guy who has shut down emotionally, and whose trip home forces him to do some self-reflection. It's a tale with too many tangents, with a Thomas Newman score to cue the meaningful moments, and a saccharine Bon Iver song ("Holocene") that must have been used in a dozen movies by now - and twice in this one.

Sure, there's a witty reference to another, vastly more momentous legal drama (To Kill a Mockingbird, Robert Duvall's film debut). And yes, Farmiga gets to call out Downey, and stay in character, for "that hyper-verbal vocabulary vomit thing that you do."

Small pleasures, in a bigger mess.

Directed by David Dobkin. With Robert Duvall, Robert Downey Jr., Vera Farmiga, Leighton Meester, Billy Bob Thornton, Vincent D'Onofrio. Distributed by Warner Bros.

Running time: 2 hours, 21 mins.

Parent's guide: R (sex, profanity, adult themes).

Playing at: area theaters.EndText

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