Killing Them Softly

Killing Them Softly is about a trio of thieves who rob the wrong people and end up with the gang and a hit-man (Brad Pitt no less) on their trail. The advertising describes it as a 'black comedy/drama,' although I found little to laugh at during the whole thing. It seems like its trying to be a homage to 'overly-talkie' films like Quentin Tarrintino writes, but sometimes the dialogue simply went nowhere.

The actors are all great. It has a stellar cast who do their best, plus the cinematography is all top notch. There's some, but not as much as you may have been led to believe, violence in it. If you've heard this is a violent film, they're probably referring to one particular scene midway through the film. Apart from that, there's actually very little else that will shock you visually.

So it has good actors, a good setting, quirky dialogue and a premise that, although not totally original, is certainly watchable. I can see how some people liked it. Although, not everyone did. Some may say that the only thing missing from such greatness is a story. The narrative doesn't really have much focus and flits back and forth from different people leaving you wondering where you'll be next.

And then there's the politics. Throughout the film we're constantly seeing the 2012 presidential election campaign on TV screen. Apparently (and I have to confess that I didn't get this) the whole film is an allegory of modern America, i.e. one character represents the American public's sense of despair and apathy, while another represents the American public's sense of knowing what's really happening, but knowing they can't do anything about it and so on.

There's a lot to like about Killing Them Softly. There are some very good bits here and there. But then that's the problem - for every good scene there's a dull one that either goes on for too long or doesn't go anywhere.

Not bad, but could have been better.

There is more wordplay than gun-play here and it is a Neo-Noir, hard-boiled, unfettered attempt at gritty realism. Some of the extended dialog scenes are pretty good but not quite excellent. There is some rambling and pointless exchanges with little pay-off.

But there are some serious, reality sound bites that give us the same thing. There is that continuous backdrop of Political rambling rhetoric that mirrors the Character's innate ability to speak much and say little.

This is an against the grain try at alternative, smart Cinema with just enough stylized graphic violence to make it obvious that this has Artistic commentary and not Documentary style Cinema Verite on its mind. Overall it is a well done and interesting kind of side-step from the usual whiz-bang editing and shaky Camera stuff that has become so common.

This is slow, bordering at times on tedious, but never a bore. It is well crafted but does not quite reach that level of great Prose transferred to great Film. But it is a good try at a very difficult, rarely achieved process that creates the best of this kind of thing.

This is a film that looks outstanding. It has that feel of the best seventies cinema. The acting similarly is outstanding but still, a few things stop it from being the stone cold classic it could have been.

The cracks started to show when Cogan(Pitt) has his first talk with Mickey(Gandolfini). It's the latest in a long series of head to heads that play out more like acting master-classes than anything relating to the film. That scene effectively breaks the spell and reminds us that we are watching "good quality acting" combined with "a good script".

The film seems to go off the rails after this. Any charm or involvement is soon stopped by another showy scene from the director who seems more concerned with showing off his film making skills than actually making a good film.

The final thing that jars is Brad Pitt. He had the same effect on Fight Club. Pitt is too big a star for a film like this. He simply doesn't convince as the cynical cold blooded killer. Why would such a man spend that much time on his physical appearance for instance?. A more earthy, hard boiled actor could have made the character believable.

Not a bad film but overbearingly condescending at the finale (which I won't spoil here). The film that went before doesn't earn that pay off and its impact isn't felt on the screen. Which makes the end deeply unsatisfying.

Shame really as with more editing and less egos involved, this could have been so much better.

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.

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.