A vile disaster.
Running Scared (2006)
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Reviews Counted:126
Fresh:50
Rotten:76
Average Rating:4.5/10
Consensus: This film runs with frenetic energy punctuated by gratuitous violence but sorely lacks in plot, character development and stylistic flair.
Runtime: 2 hrs 2 mins
Genre: Action/Adventure
Synopsis: Not the 1986 Billy Crystal-Gregory Himes buddy cop movie of the same name, 2006's RUNNING SCARED is writer/director Wayne Kramer's (THE COOLER) take on the violent gangster crime genre. Paul Walker... Not the 1986 Billy Crystal-Gregory Himes buddy cop movie of the same name, 2006's RUNNING SCARED is writer/director Wayne Kramer's (THE COOLER) take on the violent gangster crime genre. Paul Walker (THE FAST AND THE FURIOUS) plays Joey Gazelle, a low-level Mafia thug who finds himself in the middle of a drug deal gone wrong, with a hail of gunfire and some dead undercover cops as the net result. Fleeing from the scene, Joey is charged with getting rid of one of the steel snub-nosed revolvers used to kill the cops. Instead, he stashes the gun in his own basement, just in case he ever needs insurance against his own gang. Unfortunately, Joey's 10-year-old son, Nicky (Alex Neuberger), and his best friend, Oleg (Cameron Bright), see where the weapon is hidden. Oleg, whose Russian mob-connected stepfather is physically abusive towards him and his mother, steals the gun to exact revenge. Shooting his father in the shoulder, he runs away with the "hot" gun. This forces Joey to embark on a nightmarish 18-hour journey to locate Oleg and the gun before his own gang, the Russian Mafia, or bad cop Detective Rydell (Chazz Palminteri) finds them or the true link between the gun and the crimes. In a film dedicated to directors Sam Peckinpah, Walter Hill, and Brian De Palma in the closing credits, Kramer splatters the screen with a level of violence that would make those masters proud. Drained of bright colors, stylish, and feverishly fast-paced, RUNNING SCARED is one bloody thrill-ride. [More]
Starring: Chazz Palminteri, Paul Walker, Cameron Bright, Ivana Milicevic
Starring: Chazz Palminteri, Paul Walker, Cameron Bright, Ivana Milicevic, Johnny Messner, Vera Farmiga
Director: Wayne Kramer
Director: Wayne Kramer
Screenwriter: Wayne Kramer
Producer: Brett Ratner, Andrew Pfeffer
Composer: Mark Isham
Studio: New Line Cinema
Reviews for Running Scared
Kramer stokes kinetic energy and hard-R intensity...may amount to no more than a punch to the gut, but...it's all in bad fun.
Could have been a good exploitation flick if it didn't get carried away with piling on the plot twists.
It's lower on the food chain than a mere exploitation picture because it clings so desperately to the notion that it's a serious movie about violence; it doesn't even have enough integrity to serve up cheap, sick thrills for their own sake.
Writer/director Wayne Kramer's approach to storytelling is to withhold any information that might give away the plot. The film is a string of violent confrontations between characters whose relationships to each other are unclear.
A potential howler done in by a tendency to wear too much body tissue on its sleeve.
In the gleefully violent Running Scared, the writer and director Wayne Kramer tries to go over the rainbow and put a self-consciously bloody spin on once upon a time.
With a complex plot that unspools with surprising clarity, Running Scared displays a reckless intensity.
The hallucinatory crime thriller Running Scared, written and directed by Wayne Kramer, is pretty awful.
Running Scared goes so far over the top, it circumnavigates the top and doubles back on itself; it's the Mobius Strip of over-the-topness. I am in awe.
Everything feels begged, borrowed and stolen from other better movies, from Quentin Tarantino's exclamation-point violence to the slo-mo bullet trajectory shots from The Matrix.
If Running Scared sometimes looks like a storyboard sprung violently to life, Kramer's assured direction turns that into its greatest strength in the clinches, of which there are plenty.
It's like a gruesome merry-go-round filled with unpleasant characters and bad acting.
Luciano Pavarotti's eyebrows during the Olympic opening ceremonies were disturbing. Multiply that by about 1,000, and you have the creep-out factor in the gory Running Scared.
If it's possible to admire his movie's heedless energy, it's also possible to hate its guts.
This is the kind of movie where character development consists of a guy mentioning in passing he has a meth lab in his back yard.
If Running Scared were set in Hell (the actual place, rather than a figure of speech), perhaps it would have been easier to swallow.
Running Scared is decently acted and divertingly brutal, but it’s also a giant step backward for its maker.
Latest News for Running Scared
February 22, 2007:
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Following a busy holiday weekend when five new releases opened nationwide, the crowded marketplace will now face another four new films invading multiplexes everywhere. More...
March 31, 2006:
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Peter Dinklage, indie-centric actor best known for his work in "The Station Agent" and "Elf," has been tapped by Disney to play the villain in the studio's... More...
February 27, 2006:
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Tyler Perry's follow-up to "Diary of a Mad Black Woman," "Madea's Family Reunion" had no trouble leaping to the top of the box office in its first weekend,... More...
February 24, 2006:
"Scared" Director Seeks "Evil
Wayne Kramer, director of "The Cooler" and this weekend's "Running Scared," will write and direct his next flick for Weinstein Co. It's a horror flick called... More...
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