Smokin' Aces
As a concept, ‘Smokin' Aces' sounds like a cool idea. The Mob wants to wipe out a guy who's about to turn snitch to the FBI, all set to deliver his information and waiting safely in a secret location. This secret location is leaked and there's a $1 million bounty put on the guy's head, which attracts some of the world's top assassins who are all trying to get to him first. It even has a cool title, with the guy they are after nicknamed ‘Aces' for his skills with card tricks. That premise alone is enough to make a cool, no-brainer action flick that would, if nothing else, be entertaining.
So how does Smokin' Aces fail?
In the first five minutes, Smokin' Aces tries to weave an intricate plot behind this cool premise. The FBI have these mobsters under surveillance and the mob guys are discussing their plans to order a hit on ‘Aces' but the frustrating thing here, and it is totally deliberate, but you can barely hear the detail of what's being said. This is a vague mis-direct so the audience doesn't exactly know what's going on. Unfortunately, this bewilderment stayed with me for the entire film – I had little idea what was going on all the way through. ‘But it's an action move about assassins competing to kill a dude' I thought to myself, ‘what's there to know'.
I enjoyed parts of this film that could be viewed in this way, without having to worry about the ‘intricate' story thread. You can watch bits and be like ‘that's kinda' cool' which is what the entire film should have been, but it isn't. There is this internal political battle in the FBI and a really obvious ‘twist' sub-plot about a former undercover agent and, really the whole story line is crap. All you want to see is the assassins trying to outsmart the security measures and get in to have a crack at this dude. And maybe, I was hoping, some of these top killers would have to face off against each other. This doesn't happen.
The assassins have a couple of cool sequences (a chick using a 50 Cal as a sniper rifle from outside the building) but overall they are just dumb characters and it makes no sense that these people could be the among the top hired killers in the world. I really hated the ending to the story arc of the characters played by R and B musicians Alicia Keys and Common.
Basically, I expect movie hitmen to be these cold-blooded types with no passion and an absolute precision in what they do. I am impressed when writers take the time to pay attention to the little details of these characters and how they go about their job – you would think working in a highly illegal field and succeeding would require a level of refinement and intelligence. I think there was a line in The Jackal where Richard Gere's character said ‘It is a job that does not forgive mistakes'. That's what I was hoping for. Instead I got this first person shooter type, gun toting bullshit action film with a ridiculous storyline and a more annoying finale.
It's one of those films where you watch and you're thinking ‘surely someone told the film makers they were making a mistake'. Surely.