This entry was posted on Thursday, March 20th, 2008 at 10:18 am and is filed under Action, Mob, Crime and Scam Movies, Movie Reviews, NEW ON VIDEO, R. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.
Director: Guy Ritchie
Starring: Jason Statham, Ray Liotta, Vincent Pastore, Andre Benjamin, Terence Maynard, Mark Strong
I was pleasantly surprised when I found this little known Guy Ritchie (Snatch) crime feature. It sounded great and Ritchie’s cool and stylish hand was immediately evident in the lightning editing and unusual use of color. The slow story, however, couldn’t keep up with the pace that Ritchie sets, and eventually becomes a little hard to follow, very hard to buy and, by the end, it has become strange, surreal and too clever for its own good. For some reason, Ritchie inserts short comic book clips of the action, as well. These were different, but seemed out of place. The characters are adequate, but nowhere near Snatch standards, as is the dialog.
Jason Statham is Jake, a tough, smart hood, who has just been released after seven years in jail at the hand of local mobster, Macha, delivered by Ray Liotta, in a great performance. Jake feels he is owed something for the time he served and goes to tell Macha this, which, predictably results in a bunch of thugs making a determined effort to kill him. So far, so good. In an early twist, however, it seems that poor Jake has only three days to live due to a rare blood disease. Because of these two situations, he agrees, for some unfathomable reason, to turn over all his cash to a couple of loan sharks to protect him. Huh? I thought Jake was a tough guy? Anyway, suddenly Jake has become a lap dog for Avi and Zach (Andre Benjamin and Vincent Pastore). Don’t worry though, there are plenty of action scenes and plot twists to watch before all is revealed in a longwinded, and awkward ending, that I think I only understood part of.
Fast paced direction with a lumbering story isn’t a strong combination and, in this case, the result is a disheartening blow to Guy Ritchie’s reputation as the premiere maker of stylish crime films. Revolver is as over done as hockey puck burger, and there are better choices out there, but I know that Guy Ritchie fans (like me) will have to see this one for themselves. Maybe you’ll enjoy it more than I did.
