It was a week full of work in my office and I was very busy even after office hour that I was unable to spare time to see new movies premiering during this week. There were 2 movies that premiered on Wednesday (if I am not mistaken) and this was one of them. The other one was a huge winner in Golden Globe Awards earlier, but since I was not a fan of a musical film, I chose to concentrate on this movie instead. I am sure you know which movie that I was referring to. Anyway, after I finished doing something relating to my work at around 3 pm today, I went to the cinema in Plaza Semanggi by myself (as my wife was having few days vacation trip to Singapore) and bought the ticket for 4.45PM show. Not a lot of audience to see, which was understandable as the movie did not get a lot of hype in Indonesia. So let us move on to the story. As I am unable to provide the brief story line without revealing the plot, I would advise you to skip this part and go direct to my conclusion if you are like me who despise the facts or spoilers shared by "irresponsible" persons.
Brief Story Line (spoiler warning!)
In the 1920s, during the time when liquor was still illegally sold in US, Joe Coughlin (Ben Affleck - Gone Girl, The Accountant etc) was a World War 1 veteran who got tired of working under instruction and decided when he returned to his hometown in Boston, he would be his own boss. Even though he was an Irish, he worked together with his 2 Italian friends doing bank robbery and other places. Joe somehow was caught in the middle of the territorial war between the Irish mob led by Albert White (Robert Glenister - Hustle TV series etc) with the Italian mob led by Maso Pescatore (Remo Girone).
Joe had got a complicated problem as he was in love with Albert's mistress named Emma (Sienna Miller - Alfie, Factory Girl etc) and the relationship was not approved as well by his father Thomas (Brendan Gleeson - Edge of Tomorrow, Harry Potter 4, 5 & 7 etc) who happened to be deputy chief of police. Though Joe tried to be careful, Maso found out about Joe's relationship with Emma and threatened Joe to kill Albert, otherwise Maso would inform Albert about this. Joe refused to help coz he did not want to be a gangster.
Joe decided with Emma that things might end bad for them if they stayed on in Boston, so he wanted to do 1 last robbery where the money would be used to run away to California. Unfortunately the robbery went wrong and Joe had to split with his friends while being chased by the police. His partner Dion (Chris Messina - Argo etc) seemed to manage to get away but not before he killed some police. Joe then went to see Emma and tried to get away but Albert somehow found out about their relationship and was about to kill Joe before his father came to the rescue. Joe was beaten up by the police and finally sentenced to jail for 3 years while Emma and Albert's thug did not survive the police chase as their car fell to the river.
After serving his sentence, Joe seek Maso's help to chase after Albert who now lived in Miami. Maso agreed to Joe's request and asked him to move to Tampa and be his right hand man there. He was now assisted by Dion to handle the Ybor location. They only wanted to concentrate on selling rum and cooperate with the Cubans led by Graciella (Zoe Saldana - Avatar, Guardians of the Galaxy etc) and her brother.
Meanwhile Joe had to cooperate with the police chief in Tampa, Irving (Chris Cooper - The Bourne Identity, Adaptation etc). Irving only request Joe not to touch certain areas and he would not bother Joe. Irving had a daughter named Loretta (Elle Fanning - Super 8, Maleficent etc) who wanted to be a movie star and went to Hollywood.
Things were going well for Joe with his rum business and also his relationship with Graciella whom he fell in love with. But not for long as the Ku Klux Klan started to bother the blacks that time. Plus the complication of Irving's brother in law who created lots of problem in their clubs. In addition, the liquor prohibition would be lifted soon enough which would make their business no longer profitable as people could buy liquor easily. So Joe tried to open a casino as their backup business which would only work if they got the backup from the city council.
So could Joe complete his revenge to Albert White? Could he lived peacefully with Graciella in Tampa? Would Maso be satisfied with the casino plan as the backup to liquor business? Find them all in this crime drama movie.
End of Brief Story Line
At first I thought that this movie would be a gangster movie with lots of shooting, power struggle, huge territorial wars etc. But apparently the movie got more drama moments than those action part. During the first half hour, the movie was running in quite a good fast pace, but then it felt kind of ran out of steam. The story that went on in Tampa was done in a slower pace and although it was done quite nicely, with introduction of various characters that brought wider dimension, but perhaps due to the fast pace earlier where it created the rush feeling, this slow paced part made it a bit boring. However, during the last part, the movie's pace picked up a bit and ended with great war. And it did not end with that as there was surprising twist in the end.
Despite those dramatic scenes, whenever there was the fight/shooting scenes, it really satisfied me. The sound effects of the guns blazing were absolutely great and really reminded me of a rather older gangster movie that I loved about Al Capone titled The Untouchables with Kevin Costner as the main character.
I also loved the performance of Chris Cooper as the Tampa police chief and a discipline father in this movie which really moved me. While Ben Affleck also quite good in making sure that the finale fight scene was worthwhile. The movie also included some heavier themes that were happening during those time, such as the oppression of white over the African American, and interracial relationship. Oh, this movie was also definitely for adult as there were some violent killing scenes every now and then, and love making scenes (which were totally cut by the Indonesian censorship body).
Overall, with the more dramatic moments than the action scenes, this movie would be classified under crime drama. I found out later also when I browsed the internet that this film was based on a novel with the same title written by Dennis Lehane which was quite the best seller and won award as best novel in 2013. His other works have been adapted to movies as well, such as Mystic River and Shutter Island.
So if you are a fan of 1920s gangster movie with dramatic moments and some occasional fight/shooting scenes and you have been longing to watch this kind of movie after many years without such movies in the theater, then you can give it a try. But if you prefer the more full action kind of movie, then I worry you might not enjoy this. The choice is yours.
Happy watching!
Mike's movie moments rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars
No comments:
Post a Comment