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Friday, April 7, 2006
Soulless 'Slevin' is just a movie by numbers
The biggest crime of the proliferation of self-consciously clever, pop-culture-riffed crime films that have poured out in the wake of Quentin Tarantino is not the shoddy second-hand imitation scripts or cynical spectacles of sadistic violence. It's the soulless quality of so many films that value devious plots, smug deception and quirky personality traits over actual story and character.
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View all photosIn "Lucky Number Slevin," the seemingly innocent bystander Slevin (Josh Hartnett) bounces off the fists of various thugs and into an absurdly convoluted plot about a scheming hitman (Bruce Willis) and criss-crossing assassination conspiracies.
The entire plot depends on not one but two gangland bigwigs (a verbose Morgan Freeman and an overacting Ben Kingsley recycling Fagin in crimelord mode) to mistake the cheerfully hapless Slevin for a small-time gambling loser with a small fortune in debts.
Slevin simply treats the whole ordeal like an endurance test on some reality show. The reasons for his "What, me worry?" quips and sheepish grins become apparent as the film shifts from glib-noir black comedy to Shakespearean vengeance in the key of "The Usual Suspects."
Director Paul McGuigan and screenwriter Jason Smilovic work hard to distract the audience from the lucky guesses and fortuitous coincidences with an entertaining and energetically delivered collection of diversions and narrative right angles and double-backs, not to mention the most alarming display of wallpaper you've ever seen. When it's time to explain it all, Robert Forster phones in the necessary exposition -- literally.
Apart from the self-satisfied contrivances and awkward narrative contortions, Smilovic misses the irony of Tarantino when he lets his so-called heroes off the hook for the collateral damage of their "Titus Andronicus" revenge. It's a fun but bloodless pastiche, at least where it counts.
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