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 espite common belief, John Woo is actually a bigger
influence for indie filmmakers than Quentin Tarantino. It's just that
Tarantino-inspired films get bigger release, while the Woo-inspired films get
relegated to the back bins of mom and pop video stores. Troy Duffy's 1999
"Boondock Saints" is a merging of Woo and Tarantino, and it's one of
the better movies out there because it manages to straddle both genres with
flair and, most important of all, great effectiveness.
"Boondock Saints" stars Sean Patrick Flanery
("Powder") and Norman Reedus ("Blade
2") as Irish brothers Connor and Murphy, respectively, who after
getting on the bad side of some Russian mobsters decide to become vigilantes and
rid the world of evil men. That in a nutshell describes the main motivations for
the two leads. Of course being vigilantes in a town like Boston, which is
infested with gangsters and criminals of all elements (or at least according to
the film), the boys have a lot of work to do. Luckily they're close-knit to the
point where they can decide to "go wild" with a simple look. It also
helps that although the brothers work in a meat packing plant, they seem to be
able to speak every language ever invented and have the killing skills of
trained assassins. Who are these guys, anyway?
"Boondock Saints" is one hell of a bloody film.
It's wall-to-wall action and the bullets fly as easily as people breathe. Blood
is splattered, bodies pile up, and when all is said and done, "Boondock
Saints" is probably one of the most violent and bloody action movies I've
ever seen. Even John Woo might have turned slightly pale at the carnage
happening onscreen. Yet writer/director Troy Duffy orchestrates the bloodbaths
with such gleeful insanity that it's hard not to "get into" the film.
Okay, it's oozing with blood, but they all seem to be having so much fun
doing it! (Except for the victims, of course.)
The most charming thing about "Boondock Saints"
is just how likeable the two main characters are despite being cold-blood
killers. More than once Connor and Murphy executes men without mercy, and yet
they have such compassion and trust for one another and those they call friends
that you can't help but like them and want to be their friends. These are the
kinds of guys you can count on, the kind who will watch your back come hell or
high water. They're true friends and true brothers, and maybe that's why it's so
hard to see them as anything besides "nice boys" who've decided to rid
the world of evil influences.
When the brothers start making a name for themselves, they
take on a third man in Rocco (David Della), a bag man for the mob who dreams of
getting even with his employers/tormentors. Rocco is slightly "off"
and provides the film with a lot of laughs as well as some very offbeat moments.
Besides a gathering of mobsters hunting for the boys, Willem Dafoe also shows up
as a gay (and very eccentric) FBI agent who has a soft spot for our Irish lads
and may or may not be sympathetic to their burgeoning roles as the saints of the
title. Comedian Billy Connolly shows up in an oddly effective role as the Duke,
a notorious mob hitman who is currently serving a life sentence in a jail cell
that would make Hannibal Lector jealous.
Calling Duffy's work a marriage of Woo and Tarantino is a
little unfair, since I've always said (and will continue to say) that even Woo
and Tarantino were "influenced" by someone else that came before them.
Of course I wouldn't give Duffy such a label if it weren't so obvious that he is
heavily influenced by Woo's sense of style and action and Tarantino's snappy
dialogue and nonlinear narrative. "Boondock Saints" skips through time
and treats flashbacks and slow motion sequences as if they're going out of
style.
Yet, Troy Duffy and cinematographer Adam Kane has fashioned
a fine action film here. Although I do have a slight problem with the film's
lack of plotting. After the boys accidentally wipe out the local Russian mob,
they decide to become vigilantes, and bounce from hit to hit without any real
purpose except to, well, kill more people. Of course it also never occurs to the
boys that they've become criminals themselves, and have also become accomplices
to Rocco's wanton slaughter of innocents at a soda shop and a peep show.
(Somehow I doubt if pleasuring yourself to a stripper in a private booth
qualifies as being "evil men.") Some of "Boondock Saints"'s
nagging questions are answered towards the end, but the film still feels a
little disjointed in the arena of character motivations.
"Boondock Saints" is a slick film with action
that, although exciting in execution, is really nothing new. The most you can
ask for is a film that does what it does well, which "Saints" does
accomplish. One can only hope that writer/director Troy Duffy will find a
distinctive voice in future work, because he certainly has the visual flairs
necessary to have a long career in action filmmaking.
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