Actors and film could use a shave in this cops and robbers fairy tale.

Rating: 5/10 (5 October 2010)

Director Ben Affleck displays a much better grasp of storytelling and film grammar in his second time (the belabored Gone Baby Gone) out as director but his overbearing le petit Marlon Brando lead eats up too much celluloid and The Town loses its grip not far from the finish line before convulsing in mawkish sentimentality as it takes incredulity and perverse optimism into another stratosphere.
Doug MacRae and his gang are an efficient quartet of armored car and bank robbers operating out of Charlestown MA. He foolishly becomes involved with a bank employee in one of his robberies and this sets off all sorts of alarms for the gang and the FBI. Mercifully in between we are treated to some hair raising chases and shootouts climaxing at Fenway Park.
Afflecks cloying Doug is all moody torpor and the sadness of his childhood and newly uncovered information about it are met with dumbfounded and inexpressive stares. It's embarrassing Brando in need of a shave. Also in need of some facial landscaping is FBI pursuer Adam Frawley played by Jon Hamm with a refreshing touch of sadism. As Mac Crae's trigger happy sidekick Coughlin, Jeremy Renner is Cagney 2000 and the worse for it. Peter Postlewaite as a Whitey Bulger like florist walks away with acting honors. Better to watch two hours of an ugly grand actor emote than the flat handsomely chiseled features of the melancholy Townie Affleck who has as much range as Ahab at short.
Director Affleck does have a good eye for capturing the congested New England Town of Charlestown as well as Boston and his chase scenes really screech with suspense but the weight he accords the unreality of the films romantic aspects puts the breaks on The Town allowing it to advance no further as this self indulgent noir has a head on collision with a fairy tale ending that fades to a folk song over credits.
This is the second example of more is worse in The Friends of Eddie Coyle wanna be stakes. First there was the bloated The Departed with a roster of Easter hams and regurgitations of Scorcese violence and now this slick looking slam bang / implausible romancer.
The minor masterpiece Coyle choked with realism and an unromantic mood of taedium vitae that today's cool and Affleck's incurable romanticism just won't allow. It may look and taste good but that's because its filled with sugar.