bryangary65

Enjoyable gangster film with Johnny Depp quite convincing as John Dillinger and Christian Bale doing what he does best playing intense characters.

I do like crime movies from this 1920/1930s era though this is no Godfather or Untouchables it's a decent enough watch with a string of now well known cast members doing a good enough job,in particular Stephen Graham and Jason Clarke.

Love some of the criminals nicknames back then which are still memorable today like 'Baby Face' Nelson and 'Pretty Boy' Floyd. In summary I actually enjoyed the film better the second time I watched it then my original Cinema visit.

The film is messy and a bit off the wall which you grasp straight away as the singing starts early. It's a movie that doesn't shock you anymore if having watched the first one,but the real pull in is the relationship between Joaquin Phoenix and the real star of the film the incredible Lady Gaga who lights up every scene she is in and the Chen between the pair is believable.

Think the current IMDB rating of 5.2 does seem a bit unfair as my attention was always on the screen which is a positive though if being honest I did not like the musical sections which took away from the dark history of Arthur Fleck.

As a film to entertain it does the job well enough especially with the action scenes and in particular the ones set in the colosseum.

But if you enjoyed the original Gladiator movie this is not a patch on that epic even though it's basically the same storyline. Paul Mescal sadly is no Russell Crowe and it's hard to get emotionally attached to his character especially with his robotic dialogue. I like Pedro Pascal but he seems just to be going through the motions here as the General.

However acting wise it's Denzel Washington who across as the best character with a delicious almost pantomime style interpretation of Macrinus.