Easy Money: La cité des égarés

Well, the first half hour was rather dull, but then the events started to roll and scenes with with chases and betrayals began. This time, the focus is on other characters, but their reasons and acts were logically motivated (apart from the depiction of the Swedish police who were always long time and several steps behind). The characters are more trivial than in the 1st part, and bringing moments with remorse into the lives of hardened criminals was not very convincing; I liked most Fares Fares as Mahmoud.

The film is okay and if you yourself are okay with seeing a film made in Sweden with only a few Swedes in it, and you avoid of pondering why foreign criminals can act freely without having proper sentences and later being expelled, then you are a right viewer.

This little crime genre film rolls along pretty nicely, because it mixes different types of criminals (the weak minded or the desperate) and underlines the strange role that Sweden plays for immigrants.

The one thing I always remember about Sweden is that all immigrants hate the Swedes. This story mixes in Arabs, Serbs and even a Mexican. So the crime communities just get on with the job - and indeed Sweden itself is just a back drop here.

I didn't see the first film, but the different characters obviously knew each other, but this is only relevant later on. All of them meet some type of nexus because of something going wrong, and have to resort to more crime. Gritty without being unpalatable, we see that crime rarely pays and there is, of course, no easy money.

You know, to be fair, there are many reasons why gangstas get caught and end up in prison, the chief reasons being betrayed and stupidity. Many times, you'll read in the papers how drug traffickers get caught because they're speeding, swerving in and out of traffic, driving with no plates, driving with their lights off at night, blasting their music so loudly the bass shatters nearby windows, or circling around a block continuously like vultures waiting for an animal to die. The prisons are fill of their moronic decisions. Snabba Cash II shines a light on those stupid mistakes drug dealers make. They may as well walk around with a red flag sticking out of their skulls while shooting themselves in the foot.

Follows perfectly what happened in part 1 and again this isn't really a typical mobster flick. You must have seen part one to understand what is going on and again it's not all about the mob itself but it goes really deep into characters.

Even as there isn't any shooting going on still it all looks rather realistic. The slashing of ones throat really will get you, sigh, by your throat. So you can guess it, the effects are good.

If you like flicks about friendship and trust then this is a must see but if you think you will see the next Godfather, then you better skip this one.

Gore 1,5/5 Nudity 0/5 Effects 2/5 Story 2,5/5 Comedy 0/5

'Easy Money' was a gripping, albeit conventional, story of an ordinary man dragged into a life of crime. This sequel, while also quite watchable, seems to have less purpose: we're reintroduced to the various characters we met in the first film, and watch their continuing, violent and disastrous efforts to make it rich by dealing in drugs. It's broadly believable if a little exaggerated in tempo: drug gangs wouldn't actually survive if their individual members generally perished at quite this rate, but unlike the first film, there's never any possibility of redemption or escape. The sentimental ending rings a little false given the disregard for human life shown by all participants.