For the Love of Money

Slow movie not much actions but cars & soundtrack are great.

Flashback to 1973, and how one brother was good, but the other was always getting into trouble. So much family backstory. About the first hour of the film. It takes a long time for izek and levi to move to los angeles, but they finally get there, and get mixed up with drug dealers. Izek stays on the straight and narrow (mostly), but again, levi gets in deep with rough crowd from miami. Shootouts. Revenge. This seems to want to be a lesser version of the "godfather", but it just goes all over the place. It kind of lost its focus. Does the wife really have to scream so long about her husband going on a trip to straighten something out? Some familiar faces....james caan, ed furlong, jeff tambor. It does have some fun music from the 70s and 80s that we haven't heard in a long time. Lots of violence, blood. Swearing. A goofy ending. Was that just bad editing? This script needed more work. Photos of what appear to be the actual family members on which this was based. Wikipedia states this film was based on the life of one of the producers. Directed by ellie kanner. Written by jenna mattison.

Of course this movie is more than inspired by Marty Scorcese's GOOD FELLAS, a gangster biopic, with even the famous scene, during a poker game, with a Joe Pesci like dude asking to his pal; "Do You Think I am Funny?" But it shows at least the underworld in Israel and USA too, Israeli hoodlums in L. A.; not so usual. And this little crime film maybe suffers from a lame directing but it remains agreeable. And as in GOOD FELLAS or A BRONX TALE, you have the off voice from the narrator and main character. I guess it was not widely known and I am not surprised that much. Poor Jimmy Caan - who worked with Howard Hawks in the sixties - who is here to pay his bills, taxes or alimony fees.

The production design was good. Excessive use of old songs though. Old music is welcomed even in a dentist's chair but they should feel natural. The actual people who's story this film tells may have struggled but it doesn't come out here. A few brothers and cousins go to another country, and a few good and a few bad things happen...Could be anybody's story. James Caan saved it. However, it tried to be The Godfather and that is something no film should attempt to do. Some parts cater to the nostalgia very well but for some reason the film feels like Styrofoam, you watch it and you don't know what to take home from it. Or may be it's just me. This is my first review I hope I haven't written anything that qualifies as spoiling.

"A wise man once said the love of money is the root of all evil." Izek (Longo) is a young boy growing up in Tel Aviv. He is introduced to a life of organized crime at a very young age and has grown accustomed to it. After a member of his family becomes to involved in the world the family decides to movie to Los Angeles. Izek, looking to leave the world behind begins his new life and a quest to live American dream. I have to admit that if a movie is about organized crime in anyway I will watch it. When they are done right they are great, but the problem is that too many try to be "Goodfellas" and end up falling flat. While this movie isn't terrible it is also nothing amazing either. I think the biggest problem I had with this is that it didn't know what it wanted to be. Even though it is a true story it seemed like it was trying to hard to have the organized crime aspect (even having James Caan in it) but it didn't really fit in with the rest of the movie. I don't know how to explain what I mean but watch it and you will see. This is not a bad movie but it tended to drag a little and I was starting to lose interest in some parts. Overall, not bad but also a pretty flat movie that had more potential. I give it a B-.