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score 8/10
This is one my favourite gangster pictures of all time and to say the least I am a big fan of the genre. The use of the camera by the Coen bros.,the cinematography and the detail of the mise-en-scene are first rate. Yeah yeah. Thats my sad attempt to show that I learned something in film school. Seriously though the sets are excellent. As in The Hudsucker Proxy the Coens really make you feel like your in a completely different time and place.
Gabe Byrne is well cast as the softly spoken loner who by the end of the picture has danced rings around everybody yet doesn't seem much better off. Tom Reagan(Byrne) is a very original character because one can really relate to him. He hasn't got the stomach to murder, doesn't carry a gun despite all of the violence which surrounds and indeed threatens him every day and is prepared to take a beating as opposed to venting hell hath no fury style vengeance which would result in a much higher penalty. Essentially he's an everyman who is playing the cards life has dealt him and is more than aware its a shitty hand but knows the best way to win is not to go for broke.
Albert Finney is excellent as Leo the boss of the Irish mob who run a very fictional Chicago-esq setting and who is a lifetime friend of Reagan who is essentially Leo's unofficial consular. John Turturro goes from a 'tough-guy' in 'Do The Right Thing' to an at times pathetic yet equally psychotic 'rat' in this picture rather superbly. J.E. Freeman represents a rather commanding and intimidating physical presence as the fearsome Eadie Dane who has to be one of the most memorably sadistic henchmen ever committed to the screen. However for me Jon Polito, a favourite of the Coens, just about runs away with the picture as the wise-cracking mob underboss Johnny Caspar, a tough talking and ambitious Italian who has become fed up of taking the scraps from Leo's table and launches his own bid for the crown as the town's head honcho.
The film offers one of the most violent and memorable scenes in movie history when to the sweet theme of 'Danny Boy', two of Caspar's henchmen attempt to assassinate his now rival boss Leo at his home. The sheer ferocity of Tommy Guns has never been so well portrayed or indeed has this very cinematic weapon ever been so aesthetically pleasing.
The theme of the film is, like many before, borrowed from 'Yojimbo' with a middle man, Tom Reagan, playing off two rival gangs. The difference is that Tom actually does have loyalty to one.Another difference is that there is a lot of well executed humour here. Thats not to say there wasn't some in the Kirisawa classic but it's a little more obvious here. There is a more direct comparison to this film which some may have noticed but believe me 'Last Man Standing', released several years later, does not hold a candle to this picture. That film took itself a hell of a lot more seriously and faded from the memory rather quicker quite possibly because you had seen it all done before but better.
A typically Coenesque surreal edge is also given by the at times unorthodox camera use and blandness of the sets. As in 'Hudsucker' and 'Barton Fink' the minimalist and somewhat austere fashion of the pre-60s years is overemphasized to great effect. The film is after all meant to be a fantasy. Yes a very adult and violent one with obvious nods to the realities of Capone's Chicago and the 30s and 40s Cagney gangster films but still a fantasy non the less.
Overall this is a very original take on the gangster theme and a visual gem. It also contains some important lessons for any aspiring gangsters. In the words of Johnny Casper "Look at this kid. Something I tell all my boys.Always put one in the brain!"
wayofthecass 26 October 2007
Reprint: https://www.imdb.com/review/rw1753161/ |
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21-11-2019 12:44:58