gangster movie

DVD of the Week: Stand Up Guys

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Stand Up Guys doesn’t really have much going for it except for Al Pacino, Christopher Walken and Alan Arkin playing old mobsters, but that’s enough for a good time at the movies.  The premise is that a gangster (Pacino) is released from prison after taking a 28-year fall for his colleagues.  He is picked up by his buddy (Walken), who both men know has been ordered to execute the newly released man.  Along the way, they “rescue” their getaway driver (Arkin) from his convalescent home and have a series of adventures.  The adventures themselves don’t matter.  It’s all  really about these old men – all adrenaline junkies in their youth – getting a chance for one more surge of excitement and mastery.  Pacino’s Val gets to ask for what must be the hundredth time “Are we gonna kick ass or chew gum?”, knowing that Walken’s Doc will once again reply, “I’m all outta gum”.

Pacino, Walken and Arkin each deliver rich characterizations.  Pacino’s Val, despite his creakiness, has 28 years of pent-up energy and a determination to party before he gets whacked.  Walken’s Doc has adjusted to the pace of retirement; he’s not looking for adventure, but just to show Val a good time with sad obligation.   Arkin’s Hirsch already has a foot in the grave, but still possesses some impressive skills.  The young actress Addison Timlin brings a charisma to what could have been a generic role; she is in four more movies this year, and she’s worth watching out for.

Stand Up Guys is available on DVD from Netflix and Redbox and streaming from Vudu, Amazon and several other VOD outlets.

Stand Up Guys: one more surge for three old masters

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Stand Up Guys doesn’t really have much going for it except for Al Pacino, Christopher Walken and Alan Arkin playing old mobsters, but that’s enough for a good time at the movies.  The premise is that a gangster (Pacino) is released from prison after taking a 28-year fall for his colleagues.  He is picked up by his buddy (Walken), who both men know has been ordered to execute the newly released man.  Along the way, they “rescue” their getaway driver (Arkin) from his convalescent home and have a series of adventures.  The adventures themselves don’t matter.  It’s all  really about these old men – all adrenaline junkies in their youth – getting a chance for one more surge of excitement and mastery.  Pacino’s Val gets to ask for what must be the hundredth time “Are we gonna kick ass or chew gum?”, knowing that Walken’s Doc will once again reply, “I’m all outta gum”.

Pacino, Walken and Arkin each deliver rich characterizations.  Pacino’s Val, despite his creakiness, has 28 years of pent-up energy and a determination to party before he gets whacked.  Walken’s Doc has adjusted to the pace of retirement; he’s not looking for adventure, but just to show Val a good time with sad obligation.   Arkin’s Hirsch already has a foot in the grave, but still possesses some impressive skills.  The young actress Addison Timlin brings a charisma to what could have been a generic role; she is in four more movies this year, and she’s worth watching out for.

Killing Them Softly: almost as good as a Sopranos rerun

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In Killing Them Softly, a low-level gangster gets two hapless losers to hold up a poker game that is protected by the mob.  The mob, of course, brings in an enforcer to put things right.   Perhaps Killing Them Softly would have been a great gangster movie in the 60s, before Francis Ford Coppola, Martin Scorsese, Quentin Tarantino and David Chase raised the bar.  It was a big hit at Cannes, but that crowd may not be used to watching The Sopranos.

We know what is going to happen in the plot.  Fortunately, we have some excellent actors, led by Brad Pitt in a character role as the ruthless and nihilistic mob enforcer.  Pitt’s enforcer brings in a trusted colleague, a hit man from New York (James Gandolfini) to help him out – but the hit man is emotionally damaged from a betrayed romance and can only focus on drinking and whoring.  Richard Jenkins plays an unusually squeamish mid-level manager in the mob.  Scoot McNairy (one of the “house guests” in Argo) and Ben Mendelsohn (the most psychopathic criminal in Animal Kingdom) are especially good as the doomed hold-up men.

As good as the cast is, there’s just not much here.  An attempt to intertwine a thread about the 2008 economic collapse and Presidential election is a misguided device that only serves as a distraction.

Return of the Gangster Movie

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During the next few months, we’re going to see some major releases of violent crime dramas.

The first, opening on August 29, is Lawless, written by musician Nick Cave.  It is set among moonshiners in Depression Era Appalachia.  The cast includes Tom Hardy, Guy Pearce, Jessica Chastain, Gary Oldman, Mia Wasikowska and (why is he a movie star?) Shia LaBeouf.

On October 19, we’ll see what I expect to be the best of the lot,  the stylishly violent Killing Them Softly, a big hit at Cannes.  It’s a contemporary story with an ensemble cast featuring Brad Pitt, James Gandolfini, Ray Liotta, Richard Jenkins and Sam Shepherd.

Those two movies were going to sandwich the release of Gangster Squad, a mob movie based on Mickey Cohn’s 1949 sojourn in LA, starring Sean Penn, Ryan Gosling, Nick Nolte, Josh Brolin, Emma Stone, Anthony Mackie (The Hurt Locker) and Giovanni Ribisi.  But one scene in Gangster Squad is a shooting in a movie theater; the Aurora, Colorado, tragedy made the distributor skittish, and the release has been delayed to January 13.

You can read descriptions and view trailers of upcoming films at Movies I’m Looking Forward To.  Here’s the trailer for Killing Me Softly:

Outrage: a hardass gangster movie for the Holidays

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If you’re looking for a hardass gangster movie with deliciously bad people doing acts of extreme violence upon each other, Outrage (Autoreiji) is the film for you.  Like any good Yakuza film, there are lots of full body tattoos and severed fingers.

But what makes Outrage stand out is the pace and stylishness of all the nastiness, as if Quentin Tarantino had made Goodfellas (only without all the extra dialogue about foot rubs and the Royale with cheese).

Director Takeshi Kitano also stars, credited as Beat Takeshi.  Takeshi, much like Charles Bronson, has the worn and rough face of a man who has seen too much disappointment and brutality.

Outrage is just filmed too brightly to qualify as a film noir, but the story has all the tragedy of a classic noir.  You’re rooting for the characters to survive, but you know that they probably won’t – and they know it, too.

There is also a crime boss so cynical and duplicitous that he puts the Sopranos to shame.

Outrage is not a great movie, but is plenty entertaining if you’re in the mood.

Animal Kingdom

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In this Aussie crime drama, a high school kid’s mother OD’s on heroin, forcing him into her estranged family of brutal criminals, presided over by his sunny grandmother. Like many teen boys, he is terse in speech and impassive in demeanor.  As he is plunged into increasingly desperate situations, neither the characters nor the audience knows what he is thinking in every instance. This, along with his peril, is the key to the movie’s success.

James Frecheville does an excellent job of making us care about a character desperately trying not to speak or reveal his feelings.  Jacki Weaver is great as Grandma Smurf, an impossibly upbeat gal who can effortlessly put out a contract on her own grandson.  Ben Mendelsohn is excellent as the boy’s most psychopathic uncle. Guy Pearce, in a supporting role as a sympathetic cop, is also good.

Will the teen safely navigate through the maze of his murderous relations? Will evil prevail?  We don’t know until the final scene…and then some questions remain.

Written and directed by David Michod,  Animal Kingdom won the Grand Jury Prize at Sundance.

The film depicts some close range gunshot deaths with the appropriate amount of splatter.