Bullet To The Head (2013)

Oh I wanted "Bullet To The Head" to be good. You have no idea, guys. Well maybe you do. At least anybody who knows me will be able to make a pretty good guess as to my feelings towards another Stallone action flick. It's kind of like the Harlem Globetrotters taking on the Washington Generals. There's a pretty good chance that's only going one way. The Generals will lose, and I'm going to be pumped over a new Sylvester Stallone movie. It's just the way the world works.

And imagine my surprise upon discovering the added bonus that not only was Christian Slater going to be in it, but it also featured Jason Momoma as the main villain. Are you telling me that not only am I going to get to see Christian Slater in something not direct to DVD, but I'm also getting Khal Drogo out of the deal? How can this not be awesome?

The answer to that is not a simple one, but no matter how complicated or in depth I go into the fine details, there's really only one conclusion that will inevitably be arrived at: "Bullet To The Head" was not very good. In fact, I'm going to go right ahead and admit that as much as I wanted to like it, and as much as I checked my brain at the door, it actually sucked pretty bad. I can't tell you how sad that makes me.

Umm...symbolism?

In "Bullet To The Head" Stallone plays a hitman, Jimmy Bobo. Jimmy is also currently in the running for "Worst Action Hero Name Ever." After the standard "hit gone bad" happens and his partner gets killed, Bobo finds himself reluctantly working with a cop, Detective Kwon (Sung Kang). Kwon feels that there's a connection between the hit and the seemingly random killing, and after some crooked cops try and kill him, he's pretty sure there's more going on than what initially seems to be the case.

So what is going on? Crooked politicians. Crooked cops. Double crosses. Kidnapping of loved ones. Not playing by the books anymore. It's the standard load-out of standard action movie plots heavily featuring vendettas. Not that there's anything wrong with all that, mind you. But that stuff can be done well and it can be done poorly. "Bullet To The Head" does it poorly. The "why" is a little tougher to put my finger on, but I think in the end it all boils down to the unfortunate fact that it's just a boring movie.

Despite what the title of the movie would suggest, "Bullet To The Head" does not feature very much action. Or at least, not nearly as much as one would hope for or expect. There's a few too many scenes of Bobo and Kwon driving around town, having conversations about how much they don't like each other. Then they stop, Bobo gets out and does something rash, Kwon has a conniption-fit about how he's going to arrest him after all this is done, and then Bobo verbally subdues Kwon until he meekly gets back in the car. And I have to be honest, for an Asian person in an action flick, Kwon really doesn't do much of anything that awesome during the action scenes. That may be a stereotype, but you know I'm not lying when I say you would have been expecting it, too.

 "You just know he's gonna do something and it's gonna be good..."

This isn't one of Stallone's better roles, either. Jimmy Bobo is a character very much harkening back to the 80's, being a tough, wise-cracking ass kicker with an odd quirk (in this case being obsessed with a particular brand of whiskey nobody has ever heard of). But for some reason I just didn't feel anything towards him. It's not that Stallone is bad, in fact he's got a couple moments that are pretty solid, but Stallone's trademark low-key delivery doesn't work very well here.

What Stallone needed was some intensity, but Bobo never gets that mad about anything. Or at least he doesn't outwardly show it. He acts like he really doesn't care that much. And when the movie is as boring as it is, that doesn't help the audience care much either. I know Stallone can rage. I've seen him do it before. At least that would have been more entertaining since it would have given the impression he was having some fun. But as it is, Stallone's performance comes across more like a reluctant paycheck. The pointless, meandering voice-overs he has that pop up every once in a while to tell us crap we either already know or don't care about doesn't help matters much, either.

Don't do it, Sly! That's a really nice vest! I don't want to see it get ruined! It's giving the best performance in this scene!

The rest of the cast just kind of exists. Sung Kang as Kwon is kind of a mincing killjoy. Christian Slater shows up for a few scenes, acts drunk and then gets shot. I don't feel bad ruining that because the trailer did everything but show the bullet enter his brain. Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje chews scenery as the main baddy de jour, but it's difficult to be intimidated by a guy who has to use arm crutches to get around. Dude can barely move and we're supposed to be scared of him? Please.

The only guy in "Bullet To The Head" who looks like he's having fun, and indeed the only reason to watch this piece of crap is Jason Momoa. The amount of awesome contained in Momoa can't be measured on a human scale, and he's quickly becoming one of my favorite action guys. He turns in a performance which is the only thing you'll remember about this. The scowling intensity that's hiding behind those cold eyes is the sole bit of momentum carrying "Bullet To The Head" through to the end credits. I'm not going to say it's worth sitting through the 90 minutes that this movie takes up, but whenever he's on screen I can't deny that he's entertaining as hell.

Whenever he's not on screen, though...ugh.

In addition to being the only guy there who gives a rip, Jason Momoa also is featured in the best scene in the film - an axe fight between him and Stallone. The shear manliness emanating from that scene is enough to produce some excitement, but it's too little too late to save much of anything, and like the rest of the action in "Bullet To The Head," it's filmed so shakily and edited so choppy that it's pretty difficult to tell what in the blazes is going on.

Perhaps that's for the best, since I'm pretty sure any kind of clear view of the fight would most likely reveal that there's no possible way that Stallone could take out Jason Momoa nowadays. I don't care how post-steroid lumpy Stallone is. Even if Momoa's character was an accountant who'd never held a weapon in his life, I'd still put money on him in a fight. And here he's a Spec Ops Mercenary Killing Machine.

Sure, Sly. Pick up that axe and fight him without editing to save you. Let me know how that goes.

I'm actually having trouble remembering much more than that, to be honest. I saw this movie two days ago and I've already forgot most everything about it. Yeah, it's one of those movies. Bobo likes "Two Bullets Whiskey," Christian Slater gets shot, and there's an awesome axe fight at the end. Where the wrong guy wins. Whatever. I'm done. At least Arnold got a good movie in this year with "The Last Stand." And I tell you, "The Tomb" better be awesome, otherwise Stallone will be 0-2 for 2013. And that thought makes me sad.

This is something you'd see going direct to video. There's no possible reason this was a theatrical release besides the fact that it was Sylvester Stallone. It looks cheap, what little action it has is shaky and hard to follow, the plot is cliche to the point of boredom, and everyone but Jason Momoa simply looks like they don't care. This is something you'd see Van Damme or Nicolas Cage in. Not one of their good direct-to-video releases, either. One of the bad ones. More like something Ving Rhames or Val Kilmer would star in nowadays. Maybe even Seagal. Yeah, it's that bad.

Check out the trailer. It's not nearly as cool as it seems here, unfortunately.

THE BOTTOM LINE - A big disappointment. I've got mad love for Sly but this one hurt. When it's not simply boring it's simply dull as the action isn't good enough nor plentiful enough to warrant sitting through this forgettable mess. The only way I can recommend you watch it is to fast forward through any part without Jason Momoa. Then you've got a neat little 30 minute movie.

Gangster Squad (2013)

I've never been a huge mark for gangster movies. Their plots tend to be a bit overly complicated for me, what with the phone book of names they require us to know, almost all of them ending in "o" or "ni," and the connections between all of them, which when charted out with lines connecting all the dots resembles something akin to a Spirograph drawing. Oddly I find the same stuff in "Lord of The Rings" easy to follow. For some reason I know that it's Gimli, son of Gloin, son of Groin, descendant of Durin, but for some reason I could not tell you why Tony Soprano wants "Big Pussy" Bonpensiero dead. I have no explanation for this.

Movies like "LA Confidential" and "The Departed" just made my head hurt trying to keep up with the plot, to the point I couldn't enjoy them. I guess I'm just a simple man when it comes to gangster movies. Stuff like "Dick Tracy" or "Scarface." Cops are good, gangsters are bad. They shoot at each other. There you go. I'm all for shades of grey and crooked cops and men on the inside and informants and whatnot, but not at the expense of knowing what's going on. I even found "The Godfather" to be slightly frustrating, as good as it was. But that's just me. I don't like olives in my martinis, and I don't like convolution in my mobster plots.

But it seems an accepted fact now that gangster movies need that ridiculous web of connections and plots within plots within schemes within rats in order to even get made. It's just something those movies are supposed to have, but I've always found that to really be annoying because when it's all said and done, the only thing we want is to see the big shoot out at the end, because that's how they all always end. That is the part everyone is there to see in the first place. To have the road to that shoot out be so twisting and turning and doubling back on itself seems pointless, plodding and bordering on pretentious.

*sigh* It's just not exciting unless I've seen 3 hours of impossible-to-follow lead-in...

"Gangster Squad" doesn't have any of that. It was fast paced with a clear and easily digestible plot, and I found it to be something of a breath of fresh air. It was streamlined to the point where there wasn't anything left of the usual annoyances I have with the genre. What's left my not be anything that someone coming into it expecting a film like "LA Confidential" would want, but that's not to say it's bad. In fact, as "dumbed down" as that person may see "Gangster Squad," I greatly preferred it to something more "cerebral," and the reason for that is because it's free of that previously mentioned pretension.

I suppose it's for that same reason that "Gangster Squad" has been thrown under the bus in terms of critical reaction. Not that any of that really matters in the long run, but the 33% that Rotten Tomatoes has this film at is nowhere near the rating it deserves. I guess it's quite telling how deeply those elements of obfuscation have been engrained into the mob movie when a fun, well acted, action packed entry is shunned simply because it lacked those elements. It's a shame.

Listen up, you critics who gave this movie crap for not being "LA Confidential." It's not "LA Confidential." They never meant it to be. Accept this and move on. Stop crying into your notepad filled to the brim with scribbles bemoaning how this movie DARED to be a fun time, stick the pencil in your eye and leave the rest of us who got the point of this movie in peace. Just go pleasure yourself over "Road to Perdition" again or something.

What? Walking away from an explosion? Zero stars.

"Gangster Squad" plays out like a slightly more serious remake of "The Untouchables." Calling it "more serious" may be something of a misnomer, since there is certainly a good amount of humor to be found within, but anyone who saw "The Untouchables" remembers how comic-booky it got. "Gangster Squad" has a similar premise, what with a seasoned cop forming an elite team to take down a powerful mob boss, but this time it's in LA instead of Chicago. And we have better actors than Kevin Costner.

While I wasn't blown away by Josh Brolin's Sgt. O'Mara, the main character, I suppose he did a passable job of squinting and looking like a jaw had grown to gigantic proportions and sprouted legs. I'm not going to complain about his performance. He did what he was supposed to do. He was a hard-ass cop who didn't play by the rules, but damn it, he got the job done! I'm surprised they didn't give him a .44 magnum.

His jawline is actually a detective. It hides its badge under O'Mara's tongue.

I found Ryan Gosling to be more entertaining to watch, even though I'm still not 100% on board with him as an actor. We'll call it 70%. He has been climbing the ladder, but he still reminds me way too much of Casey Affleck, who's rocking a 25%. At least Gosling has the ability to not mumble. He's the reluctant member of the eponymous squad who's also playing the most dangerous game out of anyone, as he's having an affair with Grace (Emma Stone), who just happens to be the "companion" of the villain, Mickey Cohen.

Speaking of him, if there was one reason to see this film, it's Sean Penn as Mickey Cohen. He's another actor I'm usually not overly fond of, but I've got to say this was a really fun performance that he gave. If you were to channel De Niro's Al Capone and Pacino's "Big Boy" Caprice, you'd be in the right ballpark in terms of how fun he is to watch. Because he's a former boxing champion, Cohen is a bit more intimidating on a physical level than most mob boss villains are, and it's rather tense seeing him bare-knuckle throw down with Josh Brolin at the end, because there's a really strong possibility that Brolin is going to get his ass handled to him in a fancy cocktail glass.

I'd like to see Gandolfini do this...

In addition to Sean Penn, two other reasons to see "Gangster Squad" are immediately brought to mind. The first is Robert Patrick as a six-shooter toting cowboy cop who seems like he wandered onto the set from another movie being filmed across the street, but they liked him so much they just rolled with it. He may be out of place, but he's still a badass and possesses the best facial hair of the film. It's glorious. Plus it's Robert Patrick. And that's awesome.

The other reason was Emma Stone. Well, Emma Stone and her legs. There are certain things that I just can't lie about. One of those things is the fact that when it comes to particular people, I am a disgusting pig. I can't lie. So here it is: Emma Stone seems to be on a mission to be the most offensively attractive person I've ever seen in my life, particularly when she's sporting the red hair. And that seductive, Becall-esque, cigarette soaked voice of hers that sounds straight out of a movie from the 40's...good lord. I have a list of body parts I would be willing to saw off myself (or anyone else for that matter) with an allen wrench if it meant that I could merely be in her presence. I don't care how creepy that sounds, I stand by it.

She's also a really good actress. There is that, too.

Seriously, that's not fair, Emma. You're killing me by being so gorgeous.

With all that said, the cast really can't do too much if the rest of what's going on around them isn't entertaining as well, but "Gangster Squad" manages to be exciting throughout, with a good amount of action beats to keep the tempo brisk and engaging, and enough surprisingly brutal violence to satiate the bloodlust of anyone watching for the carnage. And for the kind of movie this is, which is a big budget B-movie harkening back to something that Lee Marvin would be in, that doesn't seem out of place at all.

And what do you know? It's also pretty funny. Some might not like that. Of course when you have lines like "You know the drill, boys" before a guy gets killed via a drill to the face, followed by brains splattering on the wall, followed by Josh Brolin throwing hamburger meat on a grill, it should be obvious what kind of movie this is. And expectations should be adjusted properly. I'm just glad I had fun at a mobster movie for a change.

THE BOTTOM LINE - "Gangster Squad" was a lot of fun. It's exciting, it's well acted, the action is brutal, and it doesn't take itself very seriously, which adds to the humor and overall enjoyment. This is not a movie made by a people desperately trying to get an Oscar like most modern gangster films. This is a movie that remembers that those movies used to be a really fun time. Which "Gangster Squad" was. Check it out.