Brooklyn Bound

This movie is overall a decent film. No big names, I only happened upon it cause Dean Winters is in it. The films main focus is on Sean, who is a drug dealer who sells drugs to take care of his mother and brother. The story doesn't focus a lot on plot, more on the lives of Sean and the people who are close to him, like his brother(whose trying to get involved in his brother's work), and Sean's best friend Rob (who owes money to gangster Dean Winters). The story has good character development, a few good fights, and a nice atmosphere. The problem comes in at the end. I won't go into specifics at the risk of ruining the film, but there were too many questions that needed answering. I still give this movie a solid 6/10, but it could have been a 7/10 if not for the ending.

I saw this movie a late night, and had no big expectations to it, I should have had.

The story of the movie is co-written by one of the main actors in the movie, all more or less not-known. That does not however have to be a bad thing, since the story is well told, and does not hurry. The actors in the movie play very convincing and sincere.

After the end-credits rolled on my TV I was quite blown away, but also started asking questions to the last 10 minutes of the movie... I couldn't make the calculation to add up. After an hour or so, I realized, that is just the way it is supposed to end, that could be a reality everywhere.

I have two words for you: "See it!"

I just watched Brooklyn Bound for the first time about half-hour ago and this film doesn't waste a minute of the film as every scene of this film are shot very well. The cinematography was great, it's meant for a film like this. the guy doing it clearly had the right idea and it works very well for low-budget. All of the acting was good - Jamie Hector(Paid In Full, HBO's The Wire) is VERY effective in his role as is the scarce Dean Winters(HBO's Oz) w/ some strong acting. After watching the Brooklynite Jamie Hector play out his part as the strong and silent Marlo opposite Wood Harris in The Wire, It was the straw that broke the camel's back in making me consider this movie even though I was pretty sold on the title itself. The film itself shows the hard times in Brooklyn and it shows the cultural diversity which makes the film so meticulous and the scenes in the projects can be compared to the likes of New Jersey Drive and Clockers only they used actual Brooklyn n!&&@s for the film. What I really loved about the movie was the fact that REAL NEW YORK STREET SLANG IS USED CORRECTLY!!! The film itself doesn't pull any punches and keeps it very real and for that I recommend this film to anyone who likes urban film - Brooklyn Bound is a gem under the radar....

You won't see many movies teaming with this much humanity, much less one that spends most of its time in the housing projects of East New York, Brooklyn. Filmmaker Rich Devaney isn't condescending or sentimental but even the most minor characters in his film are fleshed into real human beings. That's Devaney's first achievement in this movie. The second is that he tells the story of a conflicted criminal trafficking in some mean streets and he does it without ripping off Scorsese for one second. Devaney gets great performances from his cast, he tells a powerful story without showing off the superb technique he clearly has and he gives you memorable images without a huge art department framing them and lighting them and stuffing them into your skull. Brooklyn Bound is evidence of that rarest quality in a filmmaker- talent to spare, minus the ego. And the movie shines brighter for it.

Brooklyn Bound is an excellent movie. One should not mistake its decidedly unflashy tone for any shortcoming in technique. Its writer/director Rich Devaney knows what he is doing. No knock on The Man but it is incredibly refreshing to see a movie about a conflicted criminal that doesn't rip off Scorsese. Shot in East New York projects, pre-hipster Williamsburg dive bars, tenements and one luxury high rise that seems just as squalid, Brooklyn Bound teams with life own, full of vivid, human characters, humor and menace. You don't have to be a fan of Fresh or Superfly (though both are good movies) to enjoy this movie. It's real, it's compelling and I'll be thinking about it for a long time.

I'm a movie snob. And I'm really looking forward to whatever Mr. Devaney does next. He really knows how to tell a story with a camera. He gets great performances out of his mostly non-actor cast and he doesn't coopt one frame of his story to show of any of the superb filmmaking technique that he surely possesses. The events of the movie are tinged with a senselessness in the best sense, a film with a big heart that gets broken.