Knockaround Guys (Full Screen)

I only address this because those of you looking for a mob movie will find something more of a crime/mindless (yet somehow cool) movie and nothing that leans the way of Goodfellas, Godfather, or even Reservoir Dogs.

The violence in Knockaround Guys is pretty minimal. Most of the movie relies on it's actors--basically everyone besides Vin Diesel, who puts up a little better-than-average performance but ultimately relies on taking off his shirt. While this is not really a must-have movie, I would recommend it to at least be watched. It has it's highs and lows (the ending is abhoringly dry), and it's not for everyone. I wouldn't make it a blind purchase because you could easily end up hating this movie.

Koppelman and Levien, the writers behind the brilliant Rounders (and the not-so-brilliant Runaway Jury) take their first (and, to date, last) helming job with Knockaround Guys. This film has taken a lot of flak from a lot of sides, and some of it justifiably; they should have left the direction to John Dahl (Rounders) again, because we ended up with a number of above-average performances in a mess of a movie.

Matty Demaret (emerging star Barry Pepper, recently in 25th Hour and We Were Soldiers) is the kid of a mob boss known as Benny Chains (Dennis Hopper). He wants to live a normal life, but as soon as anyone hears he's a mob boss' kid, they shy away. So his only real option is to become a mob kid. Unfortunately, he tried that at thirteen and failed miserably. But he convinces his father to give him one more chance; he has to go pick up a bag of cash in Seattle and get it to New York City. He subcontracts out the job to his friend Johnny Marbles (Seth Green), who manages to lose the bag when stopping for gas in the nowhere town of Wibeaux, Montana. Matty and his friends Taylor (Vin Diesel, in what would have been his second big-screen appearance had the movie been released on time) and Chris (Andrew Davoli of Welcome to Collinwood fame) go to Wibeaux to help Marbles (Chris' brother, by the way) retrieve the money, all the while being told by Benny and Benny's right hand man Teddy (John Malkovich, reprising his Rounders role as Teddy KGB right down to the accent) that if they don't get this bag back pronto, the whole lot of them are going to be rubbed out.

Let's face it, when your main characters include Diesel, Pepper, Green, Hopper, and Malkovich, you're bound to get some good roles. Diesel, especially, is worthwhile here; his "aesthetics of fighting" monologue doesn't have the emotional resonance of the "Raisin in the Sun" monologue of Multi-Facial, but the delivery is easily on a par. Pepper and Green play their Reservoir-Dogs-esque roles capably, though as the film progresses the roles themselves get more ludicrous. Malkovich has the same quiet menace here that he did in Rounders, but the role is overexposed (it was done perfectly in the former movie). Etc. The plot pretty much falls apart after Marbles loses the money, though; the directors didn't seem sure if they wanted to make a Reservoir Dogs-style comedy or a Lifetime Original Movie coming-of-age drama. The hybrid of the two does not a real barnburner make. See it if you're a fan of any of the principals, but most of the rest of anyone will be wondering what that mess was. **