Review: TUNER

Niki is assistant to piano tuner Harry. Nikki not only has perfect pitch which makes him a natural but his hearing is so acute that he needs to wear solid earbuds and, outside, noise cancelling headphones as he describes himself as allergic to sound. When Harry goes to hospital, Nikki keeps the rounds going and one day, after proving that he can, he saves a security crew a job by opening a safe that they need (legitimately) to drill into. Impressed, the security boss leaves Nikki a wad of thank you notes with the tip to get in touch with him. Money problems. Nikki gets in touch and becomes the security gang's safe cracker. A meet cute along the way gives Nikki yet another reason to advance himself and their relationship is as volatile as their youth dictates. All good? You can already hear the sour notes.

Nikki has grasped life for the first time since he felt excluded from it by his condition. As a robust adult, he finds the rewards and hazards of connection can get serious in the worst ways. The film tells this with economy and a firm hand on the tension, leaving most of the weight to the perfomances. That's not to say that the dialogue is a problem. Nikki's condition and its history is completed slowly, through several dialogue scenes that show that Nikki has told this story all his life but no longer minds telling it again. He knows what happens when people aren't aware of his condition. The criminal code is laid out similarly, piecmeal, as needed, until the climactic dillema puts it to an arm wrestle. 

As Nikki, Leo Woodall is solid, showing a strong restraint behind his typical cultured blank. A late scene in which he smiles feels like the sun coming out from behind cloud. Havana Rose Liu's Ruthie is all nerves and self doubt beneath a sassy exterior. Dustin Hoffman knows it's not his film and gives us enough of the senior larrikan to tell us he's been places. Lior Raz as badass boss Uri is all paternal charm until he's a monster of wrath. 

A telescoped object appears like a Chekov rifle in the middle act and we clock it and wait for it to come into play. When it does, it has the cornered instensity of a novel rather than a film. This needs to happen but the gigantic stakes and vice grip coincidence bothered me. This is not an adaptation but an original screenplay. To its credit the film does take this thread into deeper waters and leaves an interesting question about a particular decision. Does that balance things? Not when I can't get the forced convergence out of my head but it's easy enough to follow the tale to its enjoyable final scene. That's a scene we have seen many times and can predict easily. Happily we can rely on Woodall's performance to get us through it.

A thriller/romance/ethical drama with heart and wit is not to be sneezed at. This is a film that says its lines and hits its marks but finds it gravity in some compelling performances. It's always good to see Dustin Hoffman on screen. A younger image of him as a dashboard bobble head in the trade van reminds of him and what his character means. No, we don't need it, but it's on the warm side of fun, just like this movie is on the warm side of crime thrillers.