Killing Them Softly

With all the dragging on of some scenes, the constant soundbytes of the 2008 presidential campaign, the abrupt ending, a lot of pointless dialogue, I'm just not sure of what to think of this movie.

There are two separate scenes where James Gandolfini's character is just dragging on and on and on about his ex-wife for what felt like 20-30 minutes. You think he might finally shut up about it but he keeps on talking about it. There are a few other scenes with dialogue don't move the plot forward or contribute to it. And sometimes the dialogue itself is just plain dumb.

I see other reviewers talking about how violent this movie is. I assure you that the claims about this movie being brutal or very violent are way overexaggerated. I think movies like Casino and Goodfellas are more violent than this. This must be their first time watching an R rated film.

There was so much potential with this movie had there been a different script writer and director, but it is what it is. Since I can't decide on any rating I'll just give it a 6. Watch it by yourself because watching it with someone else will ruin any good mood.

I really enjoyed this little gem. Dark humour at its best. Set in a gritty declining USA. Mobsters and hitmen doing business to make ends meet. The entire cast is terrific. Low key, understated and perfect.

A really enjoyable little gem!

The idea of film being used as a medium for political themes and socio-economic commentary is nothing new, even recently with films such as Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps and Margin Call aiming to tackle the 2008 financial crisis. But few films have been as unsubtle as Killing Them Softly. Set to the backdrop of the 2008 election, the criminal underworld of an American city has been hit by its own financial crisis after a mob poker game is robbed by two criminals (Scoot McNairy and Ben Mendelsohn). With no trades or money being moved, a mob manager (Richard Jenkins) brings in a fixer, Jackie Cogan (Brad Pitt), to solve the situation. But none of his actions brings back confidence, whether right or wrong. Writer/director Andrew Dominik admirably uses a gangster story as a metaphor for the financial crisis, but the handling was atrocious. Dominik has no faith in his audience to draw these connections, and even worse, come away with its own conclusions; he opts to spoon-feed us the cliff notes as we watch. This is most evident with the constant use of speeches by George W. Bush and Barack Obama made at time, enforcing the parallels Dominik wanted to make. There are constant references to terminology used at the time, particularly the theme of bringing back confidence to the world, the theme that public perspective is more important than actual actions and we are reminded that the gangster world's situation is the same as the financial world's one. This forceful approach does not allow us to see a natural story. Killing Them Softly is a very dialogue-driven film that breaks the old cinematic maxim of "show, don't tell." We are told that the mob has turned corporate and that there is a crisis, but we do not get to see it. It would have been more interesting to see mob bosses arguing and coming up with theories and seeing that gangsters were unwilling to make any deals in the midst of the crisis. Killing Them Softly ends up rather dull as a result. There are some moments that show what Dominik is capable of: the robbery scene was filled with tension and things felt like they would actually kick off. Whenever violence was used in general, it was incredibly grim and brutal. There is a highly stylised moment when Cogan commits his first assassination, completely played out in slow motion — a brilliant little sequence. The film hits hardest in these scenes. The big saving grace of Killing Them Softly is the acting. There is a great cast with Pitt, Jenkins and James Gandolfini being the biggest draws. They were committed actors doing the best they could, elevating the dry material provided with excellent delivery and chemistry. Pitt and McNairy played the most likable (and I use that term loosely) characters, and were the most well-drawn and conflicted characters in the film. McNairy was the most human, reacting naturally to his situation, and Pitt is able to be cold-hearted and professional when he acts upon his deadly task. Killing Them Softly is a film that feels its political parallels are enough of a mask for it to be seen as an intelligential masterpiece, but it feels too demeaning to have everything spelled out like that, which was made worse given the story played second fiddle to these political parallels. There was potential for a great film if there was a good re-write, but it ends up being one of biggest disappointments of 2012.

This is a movie that I did not personally like, but I know for a fact that there are certain people that this movie was made for.

This is extremely dialogue heavy and I can only like excessive dialogue to a point. I also felt like the dialogue was just words instead of things I can think about. I felt like the words were just going in one ear and out the other.

There are also so many characters in such a short time that I had to rewatch the earlier scenes to actually grasp the whole plot. As for the plot, it seemed very poorly paced.

Everything aside, the great scenes were great. I love the car drive conversation before the robbery and I think that the ending was enjoyable.

I think that my favorite part of this movie were the actors and their characters. Everyone played a different character and I felt like the characters worked well with each other. I especially liked seeing James Gandolfini and Ben Mendelsohn in this movie.

The last thing is that the sound design in this movie is very unique and hit-or-miss. I personally found it an interesting change, but it could definitely be irritating for some.

Overall, you should give this movie a try because on the off chance that this is your cup of tea, you'll love it.

Killing Them Softly (2012)

** 1/2 (out of 4)

Three idiot, wannabe thieves rob a mob run cards game and make off with a ton of cash. Then Jackie (Brad Pitt), a hit-man, is called in to figure out who was behind the robbery and to take care of them. KILLING THEM SOFTLY is being called by many a masterpiece and by many others as one of the worst films of the year. I think most people are really going to hate this film because it's just so different from other stuff out there but I'm going to fall somewhere in the middle of the two groups. While I enjoyed the style and the performances, at the same time the film just takes way too long to really get to where it's going and there are some other questionable things that I'll comment on in a bit. What I did like about the picture is that it's pretty brutal and ugly in regards to its violence and characters. The film really doesn't show any of the characters in a good light as the "good" guys are bad and the bad guys are really bad. There's never an attempt to make you connect with these people or enjoy what they're doing. The film also benefits from some wonderful characters actors. Pitt, James Gandolfini, Richard Jenkins, Scoot McNairy, Ben Mendlesohn and Ray Liotta all fit their roles nicely and deliver very good performances. This is especially true of Gandolfini and Liotta. The problem with the picture is that it just has way too many moments where things seem to really get dragged out. Another major problem is that the film tries to be too much like Tarantino. The scenes early one with the two thieves talking dirty about a wide variety of objects is just going to remind people of PULP FICTION. The dialogue here offers up some funny stories but it's not good enough to really grab one and bring them into the picture. KILLING THEM SOFTLY certainly has a unique look and feel to it but in the end it adds up to very little. The Bush-Obama bits of dialogue thrown in throughout the movie also add up to a big nothing, although I'm guessing the point was that even low-life criminals have bit hurt by the economy.