Mafia Mamma is a badly executed fish-out-of-water movie that features rushed filmmaking and a slipshod script, as well as lavish destination scenery and good-looking men and women practically straddling the leading lady. Not a good look for either director Catherine Hardwicke (Thirteen, Twilight, Miss Bala) or producer/star Toni Collette, who reunite since working together on 2015’s Miss You Already.
By: Trevor Chartrand While epic in scale with an ambitious, decade-spanning story, The Traitor is ultimately a disappointing, bloated film. This movie sets out to tell the gritty true story of the Italian mafia’s first police informant, Tommaso Buscetta (Pierfrancesco Favino), however, this lengthy picture gets bogged down with an overstuffed plot. Even with such rich and captivating source material, the film is ultimately uninteresting due to its failure to satisfy in the ‘audience accessibility’ category.
Are you still thirsty for crime movies after soaking in The Irishman? You might want to give Line of Descent a shot. In no way is Line of Descent in the same league as Martin Scorsese’s masterpiece, but it’s a solid pick for people looking for to be entertained by lighter popcorn fare after watching Netflix’s consequential epic.
At the moment, there isn’t a more indulgent director than Frank D’Angelo. The Canadian entrapreneur/musician has made a film career out of mob movies featuring (and recycling) loaded casts, essentially, playing cops n’ robbers. The material is more than criminals and anti-heroes pointing guns and using twelve-letter words to berate each other, but some have argued otherwise. The Neighborhood, unfortunately, gives the haters ammunition.
Peter Rajesh Joachim, a graduate of Sheridan College’s advanced television and film program, makes his feature-length directorial debut with the shoestring crime drama Blood Empires. It’s adequate and exactly what you would expect from a new filmmaker tackling a genre that’s known for obvious clichés, but thankfully Joachim is aware enough to somewhat withhold his cast from sleepwalking through tiresome territory.
By: Addison Wylie While I watched The Resurrection of a Bastard, I often wondered where Guido van Driel’s movie was headed. It’s so aimless and without a thought in its busy little head until the existential epiphany its despicable lead character has. However, as soon as I questioned the film, I followed up with another query: Do I even care where this story ends up? Unless the movie is a slapstick send-up, the crime genre…
By: Addison Wylie If Goran Kalezic’s film was conceived a few years earlier, I’m certain Larry the Cable Guy would’ve played Victor Altomare’s leading role. The Great Chameleon has all those traits one would find in the comic’s low-brow outings – including a cast made up of fairly familiar and puzzled faces as well as cringe-worthy politically incorrectness trying to pass as humour. I think my passiveness towards poorly written, brash racial stereotypes in recent…