Was able to catch the press screening of the movie Ganster Squad last week thank to my friends from Warner Brothers.
Okay, to start off, I'm not really a big big fan of gangster movies. But whenever I get the chance to watch them, I will. In this case, the reasons were obvious. Amazing actor Sean Penn, this young uber awesome onscreen and bad-ass suave feel, Ryan Gosling, and lastly the beautiful Emma Stone.
Sean Penn was amazing in playing Mickey Cohen who is the ruthless big time mob in LA. 3 minutes into the video and you can see Mickey ripping a man in half with two cars. He was great as a mob leader, he was scary and entertaining to watch. But I wished they showed more back story of Mickey Cohen, I feel that he has a more interesting history than the WW2 war veteran Sgt. John O'Mara played by Josh Brolin. You'd expect more scenes and would realize that the movie focuses on Brolin's character which I didn't mind. Brolin stepped up and took a good swing at the role.
The lovely thing that keeps me glued to the screen aside from the mob killing everyone is every time the suave Jerry Wooters (who always finds the right time to smoke) played by Ryan Gosling (I'm actually thinking of smoking again) and every time the hot Grace Farady played by Emma Stone comes on screen.
Gangster squad has all the makings of a mobster movie. Solid performances but the great casts, stylized set, funny jabs here and there, some brutal killings, a bit of drama, but by the end of the movie you'd realize that it kind of lacked something. (Maybe I didn't like the way it ended). Yes the movie is good with all the mob ingredients, but I felt that it fell short to be a classic mob movie.
But overall, the movie is entertaining, and crowd-pleasing. Yes there were some cliches and some hazy parts in characterization and some short on ideas. But in a nutshell, it's a beautifully stylized story of police officers and some brutal criminals. I still would recommend this movie goers and to mob movie fans out there. It has been a while since we've had this kind of movie, and I'm pretty sure this is quite worth your movie ticket bucks.
Be sure to catch the movie on January 30, 2013 on all theaters nationwide.
This is Mix signing out!
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