The talented ensemble cast and Carnahan's slick, colourful direction ensure that Smokin' Aces remains an enjoyable and engaging thriller, though the violence may be a bit too strong for some.
Smokin' Aces (2007)
Runtime: 1 hr 49 mins
Genre: Action/Adventure
Starring: Jeremy Piven, Ben Affleck, Andy Garcia, Ray Liotta, Alicia Keys
DVD Info
Release:
Jan 6, 2008
DVD Features:
- Region 1
- Snap Case
- Anamorphic Widescreen - 2.35
- Single Side - Dual Layer
Audio:
- Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround - English
- Subtitles - English (SDH), French, Spanish - Optional
Additional Release Material:
- Alternate Ending - 1. Cowboy Ending
- 2. Deleted Scenes
- 3. Extended Scenes
- Audio Commentary - 1. Joe Carnahan - Writer/Director; Robert Frazen - Editor
- 2. Joe Carnahan - Writer/Director; Common, Christopher Holley, Zach Cumer - Stars
- Behind the Scenes - 1. "The Line-Up"
- 2. "The Big Gun"
- 3. "Shoot 'Em Up: Stunts & Efffects"
- Outtakes - Cowboy Ending
DVD-ROM:
- Weblink - Consumer Offer to Download a Free Movie Ticket ($7.50 Value)
Reviews
I imagine someone like Gareth from The Office watching it, a big grin on his face, a box of tissues by his side.
The film’s whimsicality makes it a big step back for the director, who shows he has little handle over anything bar garish action set-pieces.
Just accept it as a boorish, boy’s toys blast and you’ll find that where there's Smokin', there’s fire.
A simple hit becomes a tangled nightmare in this preening, self-consciously cool gangster movie. It sets itself up for cult status but expect to leave exhausted.
[Director Joe] Carnahan aims for a Tarantino-style black comedy but wildly misses the mark. Instead of crafting characters to laugh with (or at, even) he indulges a sniggering schoolboy obsession with casual mutilation and silly wigs.
Even after ten final minutes of laboured explanation of the final twist, the plot is still riddled with holes so large that you could march an army through them.
The identity swaps, double-crosses and multiple shoot-em-ups are reminiscent of The Usual Suspects and early Tarantino, without the ingenuity of the former or the breakneck energy of the latter.
It’s a Lock, Stock-style story of back-stabbing hoods, bloodshed and boys' toys that boasts a cracking cast on top form. Highly entertaining.
Using the kind of snazzy flashbacks, blood fetishism and moronic villains that were so in vogue oh, let’s see, about 10 years ago, the action revolves around an assortment of rival hoodlums all gunning for police informant Buddy 'Aces' Israel.
Four years ago, US writer-director Joe Carnahan gave us the tough and unsentimental cop drama Narc. Now he has followed it up with a fatuous piece of nasty nonsense without a smidgen of that film's intelligence.
The garish pulp shoot-'em-up Smokin' Aces has one of those titles that instantly tell you you've wandered into the wrong fleapit.
A terrific sense of style and wit, plus solid performances all around.
Full respect to Carnahan for making the tired crime genre feel fresh, but it would have been more fun without a last-minute attempt to make it mean something.
It wants to be a Tarantino-esque dark comedy about gun-slinging, substance-abusing lowlifes. But instead it's a convoluted, slap-happy, humorless bloodfest.
Could've been a classic belch of grindhouse-throwback foolishness if not for Carnahan's apparent need to take his story seriously after all.
Smokin' Aces isn't the most original endeavor, but it has enough wit, action and dramatic weight to carve out its own rightful place of honor in the crime film genre.
An uneven, overly stylized mess that wants to recall Quentin Tarantino, but which only mines the glitz, not the depth or the sharpness of Tarantino's dialogue.
It's flashy and feels hip, but I wonder if it's all just a smokescreen much like the one in the film's plot.
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