When I think of great action movies with violent twists, I think of "City of God," "True Romance," "Pulp Fiction," "The Godfather," "Goodfellas," "The Professional," "Fight Club," "Snatch," "Die Hard," "Death Wish" and "The Departed."
Sure, there are more, but on Saturday night, I saw one of the worst action movies ever made: Smokin' Aces.
Featuring actors I like such as Jeremy Piven, Ben Affleck and Ryan Reynolds, I thought the movie had a chance. It had the energy of a teenager, the devices and maneueverings of something Quentin Tarantino would have done, and it looked fun.
I like fun.
This wasn't fun.
In a nutshell, Piven plays Buddy "Aces" Israel, who is a card trickster gone mobster. A hit for $1M is placed on him, and these seedy characters come out of the woodwork to do the deed. There is a catch though -- not only do they have to kill Aces, they have to cut out his heart and bring it back to his rival.
In the only bright spot of the entire film, Alicia Keys showed that she has potential on-screen. She is hot. She can complete a sentence, and she fares well as a tough chick.
However, this movie was full of bad writing, bad acting, violence without purpose. The movie was utter crap, one of the worst movies I have ever, ever seen, and I don't make that declaration lightly.
There were, in fact, several scenes that literally made me cringe, usually because of the script.
What's amazing is that the other movie I watched this weekend, for the first time all the way through although I had already seen 75 percent of it several times, had one of the best screenplays ever. Broadcast News.
Just look at these lines:
Albert Brooks: Wouldn't this be a great world if insecurity and desperation made us more attractive? If "needy" were a turn-on?
***
Peter Hackes: It must be nice to always believe you know better, to always think you're the smartest person in the room.
Holly Hunter: No. It's awful.
***
Holly Hunter: People called in complaining about your sweating?
Albert Brooks: No, NICE calls, worried that I was having a heart attack.
***
We're raising a generation of movie watchers who care more about cartoon and fantasy characters (Spider Man, Superman, hobbits, rats, shreks, etc.), which are much easier to market, than they do great writing. It doesn't have to be tedious.
I really wish every movie made could be like "Broadcast News" -- smart, funny, warm, romantic, and no other movie ever done was anything like "Smokin' Aces."
Please, do not waste your time. It was a gargantuan turd.
Labels: movies, pop culture
Don't be a snob. Just because a movie is science fiction doesn't mean that it can't have great acting or dialogue . Most movies of any genre are crap.
Actually, my comment was geared toward fantasy, and I consider Spider Man, Superman, etc. in more of a fantasy genre than a science-fiction genre if only because the former are typically tied to cartoon comic books.
Superman, btw, is one of the best movies ever, ever made. Great dialogue. Great everything. However, you have to admit, most of these movies are geared toward kids, and they're created more because of the marketing opportunities than for the opportunity to create art.
The likelihood of seeing a movie with great acting and dialogue, IMHO, is way greater in something that isn't sci-fi, fantasy or kid-oriented than otherwise -- indie movie, documentary, romantic comedy, drama, action -- stuff that's made for adults.
Not a snob, but two hours is just way too much to waste on crap -- and, in this case, Smokin' Aces was base, senseless crap.