Kill the Irishman

Wow..... Wow..... Wow.............

I DID NOT EXPECT THAT! I AM STUNNED!

The Hunter becomes the Hunted in KILL THE IRISHMAN. In the year 1976 in Cleveland 36 bombs went off but could they get Danny Greene?

Based on the life events of Irish American gangster Danny Greene KILL THE IRISHMAN is by far one the most involved movies I have watched of its kind. Danny Greene a gangster from Cleveland in 1970s is a man with pride and honor. Quite unusual traits for a gangster don't you think? Exactly what I did think as well until I completed the whole movie! Danny Greene's story brings to light the hardships that certain people go through to meet their ends in life. Although not most of them are legal methods, sometimes these seem to be the only way out for some of them. Most learned folk at this point would think I am a few screws lose upstairs to agree with an illegal approach to life. I sincerely believe that all humans will tread paths they never would if they too are pushed to extreme limits. This is just me, however I am sure some may feel that to die with hunger is better than steal, try it and let me know! Please note I am not promoting criminals since Danny Greene's revelation is entirely different. Danny Greene earned his bread and butter until the associations abused them and ill-treated them. Danny stood up to them and took over the associations and became a self-found businessman. However when authorities came for him few years later, he did not run, he had the courage to stand up to his faults.

Ray Stevenson, Christopher Walken, Vincent D'Onofrio and Val Kilmer bring to life the dark early 1970s of Cleveland. I am impressed of the precision performances. Especially Ray Stevenson, he is amazing and its wise choice by the casting directors to go with an unfamiliar face (although Ray Stevenson has appeared in a fair number of movies) since it's a biography of an actual person. I believe Ray Stevenson fits into the character with ease rather than to have a Hollywood regular play the protagonist. I need not speak about Christopher Walken, you put him in front of a camera and wonders emerge. Val Kilmer's weight does not stop him from slamming a great performance either. Unison is what it is with these men pulling the movie through.

A very appropriate and touching soundtrack evokes a great emotion within me. Much like BRAVE HEART or ROBIN HOOD PRINCE OF THIEVES she captures and wraps me with a strange enchantment. It's like a spell, I need to admit there were moments in the early parts of the movie where I did consider switching it off. The interest did not seem to be consistent. In my terms the attention span of the viewer is violated with Jonathan Hensleighs directorial approach. It lost me a few times, however it did not LOSE me. I am having difficulty expressing what I felt, let me try to elaborate. It's like water, tasteless, however after a long night when you wake up dehydrated after one too many drinks, and that one glass of water you have at that point of time is the perfect drink. This is the only way I can bring myself to explain the feeling of this movie.

A definite skip for those who look out for action and cleverly choreographed fight sequences. A good one for the mature audience who savor biographies and slow paced dramas.

This is how I see it, nothing more nothing less!

Title: Kill the Irishman Directed by: Jonathan Hensleigh Starring: Ray Stevenson, Vincent D'Onofrio, Val Kilmer, Robert Davi, Vinnie Jones & Christopher Walken Rated: R for strong violence and some sexual content/nudity Rating: 07/10 106 Minutes

The author of the book in which the movie is based has a unique insight, he's a cop, his family was part of the old "mustache pete" mafia. the book and the movie, demonstrate in realistic detail just how far the Mafia has declined in the post golden era of the 50s and 60's. One Irishman, with the help of an old Mafia associate, showed the world just how incompetent the mob had become in Cleveland and elsewhere. The movie deftly shows that level of incompetence.

Ray Stevenson does a credible job as Irish Danny Green and Vincent D'Onforio is even better as the conflicted John Nardi. Christopher Walken is barely visible as Shonder Burns. Tony Lo Bianco does a great job of a weak, indecisive mob boss who just can't get it right.

The movie is burdened with low production value, but the story is true. And the life they highlight deserves low production value. Anyone who compares this to Goodfellows or the Soprano's is out of touch.

I was surprised at how this was a really well told story.

It was made in 2011, but took place in the mid 70s. It is the story of Danny Greene an Irish mobster who would not sell out to the Italian mafia as they fought over turf in Cleveland.

And the Director, Jonathan Hensleigh did a great job on the direction and script. Too many who knew him, Danny had a 'good' side and a bad side and it was represented in the movie. Danny served Turkeys at holidays, saved an old lady from an explosion, yet easily planted a bomb to eliminate adversaries.

Jonathan told the story in 70's film language which has a lot of natural lighting, some hand held camera, realistic scenes, and sort of a cinema-verite feel to the movie. This made the film seem like a documentary but without the ponderous narrator and constant talking heads. Hensleigh told the story with action and character. The lighting, film stock, and camera work was reminiscent of The French Connection, a gritty 70's film.

Ray Stevenson was almost a look alike for the real Danny Greene and added to the realism of the story.

Even the fights were very realistic. There was no whack, thwack of a bamboo rod on leather as is typically overdone in movies. Those fights are a realism unmatched in cinema. a) they did not go on forever, with high kicks and constant up and down moments for the hero. b) sound of fist heating a chin was very real. Fights aren't an array of sound effects. c) most real fights end pretty quickly as in the movie, a few punches and the guy is down and you beat him up, he doesn't keep popping up like a whack a mole after being knocked out. Thank goodness the fights didn't go on forever with 'artsy' camera angles.

The feel of this movie was gritty, and matched the grittiness of the story and labor (garbage and longshoreman activities) and you didn't feel the supporting cast was acting but that you were watching a mafia spy cam on their activities. See the extra features and the movie is pretty much the real story. The supporting cast of name actors had them nicely blended into the background and not upstaging the main character. Nicely done.

I liked the incorporated newsreel footage, and forgot about all those explosions in the 70s in Cleveland. Funny how bombs are the "weapon"of choice for criminal types.

Thank goodness Scorsese did not direct this movie as it would have been over lit and much more hyped up and with those whack fist effects and other posed scenes.

And people died in these explosions, they didn't run ahead of them like Tom Cruise and Harrison Ford to "beat" the blast.

If want to learn about the historic story of mobster vs. mobster in the 70s and an icon of resistance...this is the movie.

Ray Stevenson is Danny Greene, an Irish mobster, active in the Cleveland underworld during the 1970s. Greene started as a union organizer and within a short time, won election to the presidency of the longshoreman's guild, which he ruled with an iron fist. He was eventually an FBI informant and was a Mafia enforcer at the same time.

Greene became entangled with the traditional Italian-American La Cosa Nostra with his own crew of criminals who ran gambling operations in competition with the already established gangsters. A series of bomb explosions made Cleveland one of the most violent American cities of the era.

The movie is brutal but also has great wit and Stevenson is as charming as can be as Danny Greene. The supporting cast includes Vincent D'Onofrio, Val Kilmer and Christopher Walken, and all are as good as expected. This may very well be the best unknown and unseen crime drama ever released.

It doesn't take much research into the real story of Danny Greene and the Cleveland mob war to recognize that there was potentially a great Mobster movie waiting to be made. This film misses the mark, which is sad, because the players were there to craft something special.

The downfall of this film is the script and the way it rushes through time and space without ever focusing enough on the characters and their relationship with each other (and in the case of Greene with society) to really get us connected into the world they inhabit. We see scene after scene that remind us of gangster movie staples. Greene beaten by Italian kids as a boy, Greene standing up to the crooked Union leadership, Greene making deals with the mafia, Greene gets a girl and they wind up married, Greene beats up bikers, Greene gets a partner out of hot water and tells him never to gamble again...and duh..he gambles again. Unfortunately, we always stay on the surface of people's motivations as these scenes fly by, we never stop and get a sense of why with the characters. And we never connect with them.

The acting is fine, Ray Stevenson's Greene is tough and smart and world-worn, everyone else is fine but they just stay on the periphery and play stock characters who come and go for the most part.

If the script had made a choice to either be the story through the eyes of Val Kilmer's Cleveland police detective, or the story through the eyes of Irish Danny Greene, instead of just a linear montage of standard gangster film clichés, we all could have been treated to a top-notch tale.

The movie just proves you need a great script to make a great movie, and it didn't have one.