Lowlife

How are you going to hate on the movie, it wasn't THAT bad. It's a B movie, but honestly, the acting is pretty good and I enjoyed the storyline. If you had some big named actors do that story and you had a more expensive production, this movie would have killed at the box office. You need to take it for what it is, a pretty good B movie, with some unknown but pretty good actors. It is a good watch if you are bored and want to watch a thriller/action/comedy, I would check this out. 6.1

The actors here give some incredible performances - the director really got the utmost from them. The story is cleverly intertwined and I found myself really rooting for El Monstruo.

Be warned the opening scenes are harsh and set the tone but it does settle down to a consistent violence after the first acts.

What tangled webs.

Wildly original, gory as hell and convoluted...Lowlife lives up to its name. It's not a story you can look away from at any given time. You gotta pay attention.

This is one hard movie to summarize. There are multiple stories, characters and intersections between the two. Basically, we're following pretty bad people all with unique motivations of their own. Some want to better their situations, but with any means possible. Others relish in their evildoings.

This is not a simple story to write a synopsis about. I recommend it because I love multi-storyline films with many characters crossing over the layers. Due to the enormously different and deep players and their needs, this never let me down in for a moment. I wanted more and more until the cinematic climax.

It's not for everyone, especially the squeamish and for those who want simple, Hollywood A-B-C storytelling - especially with clear villains and heroes. This is for those who want to go dark and experience creativity.

Funny, this is almost Breaking Bad Ver 2.

***

Final thoughts: Really just wanted to see what Nacho Libre looked like underneath his monstrous mask and thanks to IMDb, I finally did. Annnd I'm sad he had to hide such an incredible mug.

This film had a Mexican film flavor to it - low cost production, everyday people, gang mentality, a little over-the-top killing. Dialogue, especially by the Nazi tatted ex-con, was believably hilariously raw. Character El Monstruo was great, although not a particularly challenging role. A negative was a not coherently edited, jumping around too much, storyline.

Specifically, Nicki Micheaux's acting. After I saw "Lowlife" I had to look her up, see what she had done before. For a Tarantino-esque crime thriller her acting was right on point, dare I say even Oscar worthy?

I like films where you see things that you've never seen before. In this case, there were quite a few, from the failed luchador who keeps his mask on all the time to the kid with the swastika on his face who, as it turned out, wasn't even racist at all. You can file this one under "must see." It'll be worth it.