Re: Smokin' Aces -- The Movie Board

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Subject: Re: Smokin' Aces

Author:
Jimmy

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Date Posted: 04:56:50 01/22/08 Tue
Author Host/IP: c-71-197-21-7.hsd1.mi.comcast.net/71.197.21.7
In reply to: Mr. Bungle 's message, "Smokin' Aces" on 04:22:53 01/22/08 Tue

"It's kind of strange to wake up, take a shower, and immediately go see a film like Smokin' Aces. I just barely drank enough orange juice to keep a handle on it."

I needed an Adderall to even finish watching it. I fell asleep halfway through and didn't wake up til that black chick started firing those rocket shots from her sniping position. That was a great time to wake up because in this altered-state I could appreciate two things I wouldn't have had they not been isolated from the mind-numbing of the first 45 minutes. First, the shootout was bad-ass but secondly, and more important, (SPOILER) Liotta's death was agonizing. Reynold's almost ruins it but they way Liotta says "Mortal" is so icy-cold that a God-Fearing man will realize the earnestness of what is going down. How many flicks like this, that pride themselves on their flippant stance towards body count feature such a moment. Thank Liotta.

"The opening of Smokin' Aces is like an expository version of one of those 18 minute long tracking shots you see in a DePalma flick, just a lot faster."

And cut like a Michael Bay. What are you on? I hated that opening and what was worse was they let Affleck take the helm in this "exposition." It was gay and doesn't build ANY momentum whatsoever. I wasn't excited.

"It's a constant stream of information, but the beauty is that it gets told with several cinematic devices that work together in a sort of roundtable fashion. It utilizes flash backs, cutting to alternate characters in different locations while they're all telling the same story in unison, and even has an occasional flirtation with plot coherence."

You do have A.D.D. You liked that? It was pissing me off. Your mind has been destroyed by MTV. Even Spike Jonze realizes the difference between a feature film and a Beastie Boys video.

"In this manner you get to meet (albeit briefly) everyone in the ensemble of cops, mobsters, junkies, lesbians, and even a trio of psychotic hillbillies."

Don't forget Jo's dad from the "Facts of Life".

"The film opens on Donald Carruthers (Ray Liotta) and Richard Messner (Ryan Reynolds), sitting in a surveillance van, punch-drunk from trying to eavesdrop on Primo and his henchmen for 16 hours."

Here they do a nice job of developing the relationship Reynolds tries to exploit later in the film. Again, I like Reynolds but he was terrible in this. Wahlberg would have ROCKED!!!

"They find out Primo has learned of Buddy's betrayal, and is offering the seemingly small sum of ONE MILLION DOLLARS to anyone that can take Buddy out. And remove his heart. And deliver it to Primo. The Feds are on it, offering Buddy plea deals and witness relocation, while coordinating a defense for their witness, who is now being talked about by cops, mobsters, bail bondsmen, Booger from Revenge of the Nerds, and a cadre of very colorful contract killers."

You're giving credence to contrivance. Was I fooled by red herrings? Yes. But only because they were so nonsensical and devoid of logic that any device offered at the end was going to beguile. Doesn't make it work.

"And like I said; if you've seen the commercials the rest fills itself in. How many fucked up and cool professional assassins does it take to kill a tweaked out snitch? You might be surprised."

But they throw most of them away. Where were the showdowns? The only one that worked was the Spic Liotta takes out and since he takes out Liotta it's balanced. The Nazi's are gunned down by the blacks. The blacks get redemption for their disavowal of homosexuality. The weasal escapes. It SUCKED!!!

"Director Joe Carnahan hasn't done a 180 from his watershed film Narc,"

Watershed? LOL! The one with Liotta in Detroit torturing the pretentious rapper from "Higher Learning?" That part was sweet but the rest of the movie was a bore. Who was Ray's partner?........Jason Patric. Forgettable.

"...but Smokin' Aces is different. Injected with a healthy dose of QT..."

EXACTLY!!! Aren't you sick of everyone jocking him? He made such an imprint that anyone who dares go near it will always face immediate comparisions they cannot live up to. So what is this? An overflow of Q.T.? I'll wait every five years for the real thing so it doesn't get stale. Shit, Tarantino can't get stale.

"...he maintains the gritty, '70's vibe of Narc, but extrapolates it to some fast paced cutting and gory hyper-real action sequences (.50 caliber bullets and chainsaws in the ass)."

Again, go download "Sabotage." Ahhhhhhwwwwwwwwww CAN'T STAND IT!!! I KNOW YOU PLANNED IT!!!!

"It's like he moved into the '80's realm of genre action films, but with a 2007 slickness and attention to well-timed violence that only dates it yet again."

Hey, that's very insightful synergy. I wouldn't have noticed that. Great point.

"In a way that makes it feel somewhat disposable, but it isn't;"

LOL!

"...mainly because there is a gravitas to how Carnahan has written the characters. The ensemble cast is directed in an very agile fashion. Be it the opening sequences when you realize Ben Affleck can really act alongside Peter Berg,"

LOL! What's so great about Berg? You know he directed "Blue Crush" right? Outside of "Copland" name a performance where he shined? I think it says more about Affleck's inability than Berg's abilities.

"...or that Ray Liotta is still a badass,"

FUCKING AGREED!

"...or that for some reason Ryan Reynolds is believable as a grizzled and pissed-off cop who takes no shit,"

How much coke did you snort on the way to the theatre? Reynolds sucks in this. Not his realm. Smart-ass and dealing with girl trouble? YES!!! I'm behind Reynolds. Hot-shot, maverick F.B.I. Agent...YEAH RIGHT!!!

"...or that Alicia Keys is believable at all."

Dude, you're easy. She sucked. Her and her partner were laughable and should have been cut. This director was just trying to reach out to the Four Corners so he implements some bad-ass sistas to be featured in the trailer before "Soul Food 3". Get that fuck outta here.

"They're all testaments to Carnahan's script and direction. His cast (large as it is) runs with it, and well. They revel in the lack of a moral center while serving one."

And they're so completely self-aware of this that the audience is irked by the actor instead of immersing their attention onto the performance. I can just imagine Keys being offered this script over a lunch at Spago by Piven's Ari.

"But therein lay the main problem with Smokin' Aces. There are only a couple of characters that you could actually root for."

The Nazis? Just kidding. I noticed you haven't mentioned Bateman. He was funny in his first scene. Really funny.

"They aren't the ones you expect and when you do find a likeable character it's only because the script commands it."

I disagree. You're right about the majority of them but the opening dialog between Liotta and Reynolds is enough to make me believe they were tight. You know Reynolds looks up to him through the dialog. That worked for me and maybe that's why I viewed the film with a different scope. You said the hell with all of them. Evenso, a viewer should be able to distinguish his affection towards the honorable lawmen and the thugs he wants to see mowed down.

"It knows it has to have something resembling a lead actor that is sympathetic, so it falls on Reynolds."

Hmmm, I thought the same thing but only due to the ending. He doesn't make himself stand apart til then and THIS is where the script does it for him.

"He does deliver, as well as Alicia Keys as one half of a lesbian assassin team. Though their paths only cross at one point in the film, it's at that point you know who you want to see make it out alive."

I wanted Reynolds to shoot her. And here you are alluding to the type of showdown that's supposed to make you reach for air. This isn't Newman and McQueen in "The Towering Inferno" or DiCaprio and Damon in "The Departed." It's DMX and Jet Li in whatever the fuck that was called.

"The dialogue is another problem. It balances a convoluted (more so then it would seem on the surface) story, with hyperbolic, too-cool-for-school pop-culture colloquialism that just makes you think of Tarentino, and the many writers that didn't write as well as this."

Good point. But the one thing I sort of liked goes back to what you were saying earlier about the inter-connected cutting. At times, this worked well with the dialog where the actor from the next scene picked up where the actor from teh previous scene had left off. This did give it some momentum but it was too obvious and by this point you HATE the director and the writers so you don't want to give them any cred.

"Granted, Pulp Fiction is an old movie now, but it was followed by 10 years of imitators that Smokin' Aces probably wants to ignore. Fortunately, Smokin' Aces is good enough to make that suspension of "been there, done that" disbelief possible."

I disagree. Have you ever seen "The Truth About Charlie"? There's a film that borrow heavily from "Pulp Fiction." So does "Out of Sight". The difference is they each found their own tones. They didn't take Pulp Fiction and Cocaine and infect the rest of the world with their pretentious bullshit. I'd argue the easiest way to replicate Pulp is to put it on high octane. Charlie goes for flip and Sight meloncholy.

"It's high points are well shot violence, solid acting, assured direction, drugs, insane contract killers, and some tits. I was warned this would be the case, and it thankfully delivered on all fronts. It's a well crafted film that's as entertaining as a getting a blowjob from your girl in the back row of a packed movie theatre.
And just as reckless."

And equally as meaningless once you're done.

"P.S. The presentation of the film was excellent. The seats at Hollywood rock, the sound was awesome, and the picture was crystal. I wish Pan's Labyrinth were playing there."

I may have been treated to the cheap thrills you got had I seen it at the theatre but I got those at home. But no matter how good a TV it never equates to the theatre. Perhaps, in the right mood, this movie would have motivated me...but that mood coincides with stupid.

"P.P.S. I want to father caramel kids with Alicia Keys."

You've got to be joking. Her thighs belong to a linebacker. I can only assume you were trying to nail that black chick at the time you originally wrote this.

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