Rick’s Flicks Picks » This Weekend’s Film Festival Celebrates Killer Comedies

This Weekend’s Film Festival Celebrates Killer Comedies

9 07 2008

To celebrate IN BRUGES arriving on DVD, This Weekend’s Film Festival’s lineup takes a look at some killer comedies featuring assassins. One is based on a true story (only if you believe it). Another puts a classic suave spy into the role of a hitman. Another mixes assassins and high school reunions. And the final film was recently picked as one of the best gangster films of all time. So grab a Colt .45 (beer not the handgun) and enjoy some laughs and murder.

IN BRUGES kicks off the lineup. Martin McDonagh’s feature film debut is one of the best films of 2008. After a hit goes wrong, two assassins are sent to Bruges, Belgium to hang low until they get their next orders. Ken (Brendan Gleeson) embraces the chance to see the sights of the medieval city, but his partner Ray (Colin Farrell) is restless within minutes. Soon he’s befriended the local drug pusher Chloe (Clemence Poesy) and little person actor Jimmy (Jordan Prentice). But when their boss Harry (Ralph Fiennes) calls, both Ken and Ray will have a conflict of conscience. As I said in my original review, “McDonagh’s script is tight and filled with great irony. He’s working in the crime genre, but subtly spoofing it at the same time.” The bloody material can be gruesome at times, but hilarious simultaneously. Gleeson and Farrell make for a perfect odd couple as killers with regrets. Few comedies are as poignant as this one.

“Based on a true story” has never been more loosely used when it comes to the first film of our Saturday doubleheader. CONFESSIONS OF A DANGEROUS MIND is based on Chuck Barris’ unauthorized autobiography, where the creator of THE GONG SHOW claims that he killed 33 people as an assassin for the CIA. In a star-making turn, Sam Rockwell plays Barris as a seriously self-doubting man, who either had a wild life or simply a wild imagination. Mirroring the truth or lie versions of his life’s story we have the two women in his life — the cute Penny (Drew Barrymore) and the sultry Patricia (Julia Roberts). Director/actor George Clooney takes the script from notoriously quirky writer Charlie Kaufman and transforms it into a captivating portrait of a man who was once called the sole reason for the decline of human society. As I said in my original review, “The lie — if it is one — works. Like all fiction, it’s a good lie. Despite being a depressive guy, Barris’ film isn’t.”

Second on the Saturday bill is THE MATADOR, starring Pierce Brosnan as a drunk, whoring hitman who meets a troubled businessman, played by Greg Kinnear, in a bar in Mexico City. While it might sound like the set-up for a bad joke, director/writer Richard Shepard crafts a funny twist on the conflicted killer scenario, which breathes new life into the characters. Though the film is mainly a character study, the comedy thriller still contains some wonderfully tense moments, usually based around the actions and reactions of its characters. Brosnan gives one of his best performances as a brash, paranoid, foul-mouthed man who nonetheless comes off charming. Kinnear’s everyman character is seduced by the assassin’s charm and gets a chance to witness his own dark side. As I said in my original review, “Often laugh-out-loud funny, THE MATADOR also has a real story about friendship.”

GROSSE POINT BLANK begins the Sunday doubleheader followed by PULP FICTION, a film that greatly influenced the former. George Armitage’s dark comedy pokes fun at several targets including corporate America, the pursuit of power, assassins and high school reunions. Martin Blank (John Cusack) is a confused killer who is in constant contact with his analyst Dr. Oatman (Alan Arkin). Though he is conflicted, he decides to attend his 10-year high school reunion, because there is a hit close by. He can kill two birds with one stone. The person he is most interested in seeing is Debi (Minnie Driver), the girl he stood up on prom night. Mixing a sweet romance with dark humor, this satire is a rollercoaster of mixed tones, handled well by its stellar cast, which also includes a devilish Dan Aykroyd as a rival assassin who wants Blank to join the hitman union. As I said in my original review, “The film is deviously dark with its humor and stylish with its action.” It will easily supply an equal dose of thrills and laughs.

PULP FICTION, the most influential film of modern cinema. If you haven’t seen it, then you’re in for a wild ride. If you have seen it, then you already know. Quentin Tarantino’s masterpiece is woven together with witty dialogue, cool iconic characters, and pitch black humor. Various stories told in time-jumping order overlap and combine in this ingenious film that features two of cinemas legendary killers — Vincent Vega and Jules Winnfield. Played by John Travolta and Samuel L. Jackson, respectively, one killer is a thug and the other is introspective, giving us a poignant and humorous duo who encounter an act of God, a headless body in their car on a public street and two gun-totting diner robbers… but not necessarily in that order. Along with deep voiced gangster Marsellus Wallace (Ving Rhames), boxer Butch (Bruce Willis) and Wallace’s sexy wife Mia (Uma Thurman), Vincent and Jules make up an off-kilter world where just about any crazy thing can happen and usually does. Bounding with irony and cleverness, as I said in my original review, “It’s a dog-eat-dog world, but in Tarantino’s fictionalized universe the truly righteous survive.”

So there you have it five killer comedies about killers. Tell me what you think. So it’s time to head to the video store, update the Netflix queue, check out Zap2It.com for TV listings or help support the site by buying the films on DVD at the below links.