Michael Diliberti (screenplay), Michael Diliberti(story)
Stars:
Jesse Eisenberg, Danny McBride, Nick Swardson
The director Ruben Fleischer can handle actors and action well enough, but to judge from the frantically unfunny caper comedy “30 Minutes or Less,” he (or his advisers) doesn’t know his B material from his Z. Having scored with his 2009 breakout monster flick, “Zombieland,” Mr. Fleischer will next take on “ The Gangster Squad,” about Los Angeles detectives up against East Coast mobsters in the 1940s. Here’s hoping that the rest of the brain trust behind “30 Minutes or Less” will be wreaking havoc elsewhere. Written by Michael Diliberti from a story he coughed up with Matthew Sullivan, the movie turns on Nick (Jesse Eisenberg), a pizza delivery guy who’s taken hostage, armed with a bomb vest and forced to rob a bank by a pair of chuckleheads, Dwayne (Danny McBride) and Travis (Nick Swardson). Although Mr. Eisenberg radiates natural intelligence even when his motor mouth is running on empty dialogue, his character is a grade-A moron.