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Movie Review: The Traitor

When I was given the task of reviewing the buddy cop film “The Traitor”, starring Julian Assange and Edward Snowden, I scoffed and asked if my my boss was being serious. I mean, I’m a erotic book reviewer, like, “the Kama Sutra” erotic, not this stoner comedy bullshit. Then I remembered that I’ve been fired from BuzzFeed, Vice and Fox News in the last six months… so yeah, I guess I’m going to do this.

Before I sat down to watch the movie I had to be prepared for it. Cheetos? Check. Beer? You betcha. Weed? Oh, fuck yes. It’s pretty much legal now, right? Prerequisites complete, I sat down and smoked the fattest J to ever grace the 21st century.

I gently slid the big round disc into the tight slot… wait, sorry, wrong genre. After mentally preparing myself I started up the movie, then… nothing. Protip: remember to plug in your DVD player, it helps quite a bit. No wonder I was fired from Fox…

To my surprise, the movie was pretty funny. I had pretty low standards for a Shyamalan film after he made a mess of MILFs of Miami 16. Thankfully this was a great return to form, channeling his earlier work on MILFs 12. Snowden and Assange have an almost magical presence on the screen as they blow ALL the whistles. Their chemistry is what dreams are made of. They star as a bad mouthing cop duo who take on the corruption of Haardawn, North Carolina head on. In the process they foil an international ring of supervillains, and find their true loves, Mary Kate and Ashley Olsen (played by Denzel Washington and Will Smith receptively). The main antagonist, Dr. Harry C. Beaver is brilliantly portrayed by Zach Galifianakis. It is perhaps one of his greatest performances ever. I’m not going to spoil it for you, but let’s just say, his whistle gets blown reeeaaal good.

Snowden and Assange’s journey takes them all around the world, from the desolate wastelands of downtown Detroit to the sexy neon underworld of Bangcock. The highlight location though, is where the film begins and ends: Haardawn, North Carolina. Shyamalan spent months there to faithfully recreate every little detail of the small town. It’s one restaurant, its 69 residents, its redneck culture. You can really feel the atmosphere of knowing that everyone married their cousin. It’s one of the best realized film settings in recent memory, and Shyamalan should be applauded for it.

Because my boss forces me to actually score these thing, I’d give “The Traitor” a 4.2×10^2 out of 184e + 69i, because fuck scoring conventions. I’d also like to nominate it for the “Best Film that was Expected to be Terrible” award. This is one of the best films to watch stoned of 2015, and I believe that this will go down as one of Shyamalan’s most respected works.

TL;DR get some OG Kush and have a great night with “The Traitor”!