Jogando Sujo

Okay, I got the screener at the video store I work at & thought the cast was interesting enough to give it a try. I've seen enough of these promos (especially from Lionsgate) to not expect much of a film, or more than a minute of each 'name' from the cover, so after reading some reviews here on IMDb I went in with low expectations.

Overall, I'd have to say I pleasantly surprised. Lots of nice little plot twists, several double-crosses, a few scenes of genuine suspense.

The movie centers around and features (newcomer?) Mick Rossi in almost every scene, and his performance only suffers in comparison to the more seasoned actors showing their stuff. He does a decent job as an unlucky little fish caught in a sea of meaner, bigger fish.

And the long list of 'guests' do a stand-out job of fleshing out their characters & keeping the story compelling. Val Kilmer is great as a dopey 'cleaner'; Vinnie Jones is nicely menacing as a crooked cop; Gabriel Byrne, in the few minutes of screen time he has, is perfect as an understated dark angel; Joanne Whalley is strangely enticing as a long-suffering but supportive ex-love interest. Anthony LaPaglia & (the great) Bruno Kirby, unfortunately, add little as tough LA detectives, but arguably they didn't have much to work with.

My only real problem would be the ending. One of those films that just kind of stops, and after so many little twists it would have been nice for something tighter to finish on.

If you're at all interested, and can find it cheap, don't be afraid to give it a try.

New contender for worst movie ever. Do not be misled by Val Kilmer's name appearing in the credits, he appears for all of one minute. Reminiscent of Executive Decision's posters who made it appear as though Steven Segal played a central role in the film (even though he disappeared after 5 minutes).

The film has no plot, no story, no point. Worst of all, it has no ending. To date I had listed U-Turn as worst movie ever, but I think Played has taken the bottom spot. It reads as a gangster thriller, but none of the scenes are backed up. They appear more like events that follow each other rather than integral parts of a story. No climax is built up, the love story is stated but never portrayed. Characters dart in and out before any portrayal is required. All in all a complete waste of time.

Best advice: DO NOT WATCH.

If you like 87 minutes of British actors dropping f-bombs over and over this is the film for you. Otherwise it's a pretty boring, pointless crime drama.

I'm not sure what I was expecting from this movie, especially since reviews have stated that much of the script was improvised. The film seemed fairly tightly-scripted to me...perhaps this is a tribute to the cast or director.

I also expected to be put-off by the limited screen time of the major names in the movie. To the contrary, I found it refreshing to have good actors in such small, but crucial, roles. This is the only way to avoid making movies into star vehicles that sacrifice story and direction for the sake of glorifying one or more of the lead characters.

On the other hand, the plot left a bit to be desired. There are quite a few loose ends that never get tied up, including the massive loose end right before the final credits roll. There's a difference between being ambiguous and simply stopping the story in the middle of an arc. This is your basic 2.5-act movie.

Overall, I enjoyed the movie and the characters. There's virtually no character development, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. This is worth watching if you enjoy "small" stories about tragedy and get a kick out of a bunch of well-know actors suppressing their desire to be the center of attention.

Beware,this is a real pretender.You see Vinnie Jones and Gabriel Byrne on the poster and you see Val Kilmer is in it too,so it looks all good but then the film starts,shows the actors in alphabetic order and at the end it says:Introducing Mick Rossi.So that's what you get to see,about 88 minutes with Mick Rossi and about 1 minute Gabriel Byrnes and about 2 minutes Val Kilmer,only one who's featured a bit more is Vinnie Jones.So if you want to see a true Mick Rossi film (probably the only one he ever will have a leading part in),check it out,otherwise beware.The story is average too.Mick plays a small time gangster who got a job from the big boys which gets him into lots of trouble.