Three stars. Rating: R, for violence, considerable profanity and brief drug use
By Derrick Bang
Comedy is hard. Dark comedy is
much harder.
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| Giovanni (Robert De Niro) and Maggie (Michelle Pfeiffer, back to ccamera) naturally wish to know how their children fared, during their first day at a new French school. Warren (John D'Leo) and Belle (Dianna Agron) downplay their activities, unwilling to admit that their larcenous instincts — a family quality — will allow them to own the school by the end of the week. |
In theory, this film is the droll
saga of a Mafia family trying to maintain the low profile demanded of the
Witness Protection Program, while too easily sliding into former bad (i.e.
violent) habits, much to the ongoing consternation of their FBI handler. That’s
a premise with considerable comedic potential, particularly when the handler is
played by Tommy Lee Jones at his morose, long-suffering best.
And things would have been fine,
had our protagonists confined their lethal behavior to the various goombahs
trying to find and whack them, and if said goombahs had limited their nasty tendencies toward each
other.
But far too many innocent
bystanders get killed along the way, sometimes quite unpleasantly. It’s rather
hard to chuckle when another inquisitive neighbor gets shot between the eyes.
That simply isn’t funny, and it, ah, kills the mood. Repeatedly.
The trouble is, veteran French
action director Luc Besson doesn’t seem to know what kind of movie to make this
time; his script — co-written with Michael Caleo, from Tonino Benacquista’s
comedic novel Malavita — keeps
sliding back and forth between the grim “straight” drama of La Femme Nikita or The Professional, and the far lighter, satiric tone of The Fifth Element. These styles are
mutually incompatible, and the result is rather a mess.
Caleo, I note, co-wrote one
episode of TV’s The Sopranos with
that show’s creator, David Chase. That may have been the serio-comic mood
Besson hoped to achieve, since Chase masterfully blended sarcastic humor with
heinous violence in his groundbreaking show. And, at times, Besson and Caleo
almost get there ... but then they spoil it with another dollop of brutal
behavior.
Giovanni Manzoni (Robert De Niro)
and his family have spent years on the run, at various locations in the States
and now France, due to the persistence of mob bosses infuriated by his having
ratted them out. Giovanni’s wife, Maggie (Michelle Pfeiffer), has grown
accustomed to packing and unpacking; teenagers Belle (Dianna Agron) and Warren
(John D’Leo) have resigned themselves to the constant uprooting faced by
military kids.
Now, newly ensconced in a sleepy
French village in the Normandy countryside, saddled with the fresh identity of
“Fred Blake,” Giovanni attempts, once again, to blend. On impulse, he greets
neighbors by claiming to be a writer of history; trouble is, the locals know
far more about his fabricated topic — the D-Day invasion — than he does.
FBI handler Robert Stansfield
(Jones) isn’t amused; that’s precisely the sort of sloppy thinking that could
get “Fred” exposed as ... well, as somebody other than who he claims to be.
