atrocious garbage

Rating: Null/10 (24 February 2004)

beware: spoilers
I'm probably going to get hate mail for this, but I just had to say that I thought this was one of the single most atrocious wastes of celluloid ever screened for a paying audience. And I'm willing to defend that statement. Between it's poor direction, sloppy editing, tacky music and gag-inducing acting, it's incomprehensible to my why this movie is loved so rabidly by so many people. I don't get it.
This has to be the worst entry in the genre. A 1907 Mutoscope two-reeler has got to be more intelligent and convincing than this.
This movie stands as a perfect example of how bad the 1970's were in terms of clothes, hair, music and nightclubs. The whole thing is an exercise in poor taste. Pacino, in particular, is disgustingly bad as the main character. Even if your not supposed to like him, why the f*** are you supposed to care about him in any way? That goes for just about any other character in the film.
I guess people are shocked by this movie. I thought the torture-by-chainsaw scene was one of the funniest things ever. And I almost never laugh at violence. The final battle fails to be even remotely interesting or effective. If anything it's exploitative.
And then I must come back to the fact that you can never, ever, ever understand at all anything that comes out of Al Pacino's mouth. And why is he constantly breaking out in a sweat? How is it he seems to age some twenty or so years, but his buddy (who he later shoots) doesn't age a day?
Everything in the film falls flat. The action scenes are particularly embarrassing to watch. There's one scene, set during a riot in a slum, that reeks of TV-movie syndrome.
For a good movie about organized crime, I recommend: The Public Enemy, Road to Perdition, Little Caesar, Angels with Dirty Faces, Miller's Crossing, and, for sure, the original Scarface, with Paul Muni in the title role. This was one film that didn't need to get extended, updated, modernized or remade. Thank you.