The first time Daniel Craig is handed a gun in “Layer Cake” (2005), he briefly prances around like he’s 007 or something. That would still be a year or so away. We get to see him command a stage while on the wrong side of the law in this classic British gangster flick. There’s a much-coveted shipment of drugs and lots of double-crossing, just like in most gangster flicks, including the bad ones. The good ones let you follow along just closely enough to think you know what’s going on, when you really, really, don’t. This is a good one.
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Watching someone slowly die of dementia is not pretty. Spending almost two hours watching Tom Hardy act like he was dying of dementia wasn’t pretty, either. Maybe the makers of “Capone” (2020) had some high-minded artistic vision of taking this larger-than-life gangster and cutting him down to size by showing his final, decrepit days. As he deteriorates, feds and fellow gangsters circle him like vultures. Is it true that he hid some loot? Syphilis-infected and stroke-addled, Capone can’t – or won’t – say. I won’t say Hardy wasn’t challenged in his role, but I can’t say I cared to see the result.
The day I watched “The Revenant” (2015), the heat index in my town was something like 100 million bazillion degrees, so it was kind of nice watching Leonardo DiCaprio freeze his ass off for two and a half hours. That being said, the film is a fascinating, poetic meditation on survival, suffering and revenge in the Old West. It’s also kind of gross, what with animals (and/or people) being gutted every few minutes. Lots of bad stuff happens to Leonardo, almost to the point of absurdity. That, and the running time, make it a tough watch, but (sorta?) worth it.
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