The Burial

Based on true events, The Burial follows a flashy attorney (Jamie Foxx’s Willie E. Gary) as he agrees to represent a funeral-home owner (Tommy Lee Jones’ Jeremiah Joseph O’Keefe) in a contractual-dispute case. Filmmaker Maggie Betts, armed with her and Doug Wright’s screenplay, delivers a fairly generic yet mostly entertaining legal drama that benefits from the superb efforts of its various performers, and it’s clear, ultimately, that the somewhat hit-and-miss bent of the movie’s flabby narrative is offset by Jones and Foxx’s top-notch work – with, especially, the latter’s magnetic, electrifying performance going a long way towards compensating for a palpably padded-out midsection. (The introduction of Foxx’s flashy character, in the context of a gripping courtroom interrogation sequence, is handled particularly well, to be sure.) And while the inclusion of odd, entirely needless digressions does little to allay the far-from-streamlined vibe, The Burial builds towards a rewarding closing stretch that ensures it finally finishes on a thoroughly positive note. (The late-in-the-game confrontation between Willie and Bill Camp’s mustache-twirling villain is as entertaining and satisfying as one might’ve hoped, ultimately.)

*** out of ****