What's cooking? You ask? (Nadda much, just a possible "actual" first-rate Hollywood movie concerning capitalism.) Smells good. But then you commence to munch on the "dish," only to realize its taste. Problem is, the spice is too strong that it begins to become inedible. You be like, McDonald's? Let's get the fudge out of here. Killing Them Softly is too cynical and cold-blooded to even ingest. Everything else in it, howsoever, is first-rate if not approaching perfection.
Based on the book "Cogan's Trade" by George V. Higgins, Andrew Dominik's (The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford - quite a fine Western) grim thriller follows a mobbed poker game that is robbed, and the people behind this robbery, need to be dealt with. Enter Brad Pitt, who seem to have built rapport with writer-director Dominik, playing the mafia hitman finishing the job.
Fine performances from Scoot McNairy (Monsters, Agro), a twitchy stick-guy and his putrid without drugs partner Ben Mendelsohn (The Dark Knight Rises) were pleasures to watch, while Pitt's detachments to emotions conjure a minutely unnerving atmosphere. Having him as the quietly startling hitman is a matter of prized treasure. Richard Jenkins (The Cabin in the Woods) is the mob lawyer, busied in constantly exchanging coldly humored conversations. James Gandolfini is casted as a high-end mafia hitman; he's the most engrossing person in the film, in all frankness.
Seeing this stupendous selection of actors in one screen is a golden feeling, but it doesn't exactly salve the movie's exceeding violence and black-and-white characters. Everyone is buff and able to break someone's cartilage or rip off someone's jugular at will, and sometimes its all you think of on them: contrived criminals on script - not exactly human. The dark humor in the film prove entertaining at first, but it only takes awhile before you encounter and deduce the issues.
Dominik's film-noir promised an astounding and thought-provoking two-hour venture, but its superficial characterization and coldness comes in Killing Them Softly's way, keeping it from accomplishing what needs to be accomplished.
Pitt tells Jenkins in the final scene of the movie. "America's not a country; it's a business." Maybe, it would be a huge argument, but this movie ain't the boss of you, you can freely pass up if you would want to.
VERDICT: C+
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