TIFF 2010 Review: John Carpenter's THE WARD

Editor’s note: This review was originally published on September 15, 2010 as a Toronto International Film Festival review.

Writers: Michael Rasmussen & Shawn Rasmussen
Director: John Carpenter
Cast: Lyndsy Fonseca, Amber Heard, Danielle Panabaker, Mika Boorem, Mamie Gummer

Well, it looks like John Carpenter has made his first unintentional comedy. I just can’t take horror seriously when the killer is chasing our victim around and it instantly reminds me of an old episode of Punky Brewster. Remember when she played hide-and-seek and got locked in the refrigerator (teaching us children never to hide in the ice box)? THE WARD has a morgue scene very similar to this and I couldn’t help but laugh. If you know Carpenter’s work, you’re probably sighing right now and I’m sorry. My heart is hurting with you.

 Here’s the set up, which looks fun, seeing as who’s behind it: Kristen (Amber Heard) sets a house on fire and gets taken to a psychiatric hospital. Joining her are four other girls (Lyndsy Fonseca, Danielle Panabaker, Mika Boorem, and Mamie Gummer) who all suffer from a term one would usually call an ex-lover - “crazy.” One by one, these girls start to mysteriously disappear, so Kristen takes it upon herself to uncover the dark truth behind the disappearances. Cue the “dum dum dum” music. Here’s the first of many flaws with THE WARD: none of the girls look or act crazy. This is the most important detail in a film that takes place in the looney bin. If I’m in the mental ward, it’s because I’m dangerous as hell and society would hate life if I was to be let loose. These girls don’t just act normal, they talk normal (no cocked head, dripping spit here), and we don’t know any of their history other than they’re “just crazy.” Our ward staff acts more nuts than the girls do. Give me visuals or stories, I need to know not to trust any of them with my mother. The sickest thing about THE WARD is this: Carpenter might be edging toward slightly perverted in his growing age. There’s a 2-3 minute shower scene with our five main characters. Some might say this is a throwback back to the old slasher films when gratuitous and unnecessary nudity was a must, but here’s the kicker: all we see is their backs (over and over, I must add) and a silhouette of side boob. The camera just goes side to side, back to back. I seriously love Carpenter just as much as the next person, but this scene is creepy. What THE WARD ends up getting plagued with is cheap scares and cheaper effects. When Kristen is the last one out of the shower, we see an outline of a ghost behind her. The loud music booms as a skeleton-like hand grabs her by the neck. This is the oldest trick in the book, and it has worked brilliantly in the past, but here it’s just irritating. Our ghost isn’t terrifying and actually looks quite silly. The confusing part is that effects master Greg Nicotero worked on this. One great director and one great special effects creator can’t seem to thrill me for once, and I’m scratching my head. This marks Carpenter’s first feature in seven years. The man has made classics, with films like HALLOWEEN and ESCAPE FROM NEW YORK, but THE WARD just adds rust to the nail I call his recent career as a director. THE WARD is just bad. Don’t be surprised if this ends up straight-to-cable. P.S. I still love you, John. Grade: F

Sundance 2011 Review: BELLFLOWER

Editor’s note: this review was originally published on January, 2011 as a Sundance Film Festival review.

Writer/Director: Evan Glodell
Cast: Evan Glodell, Jessie Wiseman, Tyler Dawson

When I first walked out of BELLFLOWER, I was transformed into that cranky film critic you’ve once read about. A Sundance film about a young hipster who gets his heart broken over a girl? I saw that last year when it was called BLUE VALENTINE, and I even saw it the year before that when it was called (500) DAYS OF SUMMER. I’ve even seen it on VHS, because I wasn’t born when ANNIE HALL was released in theaters. But what hit me over my big, stubborn head is this: BELLFLOWER is a visual spectacle of real independent cinema. Sure, the story isn’t original, but my job is to report if I like what I saw, and dear reader, I’m here to tell you this: BELLFLOWER has blossomed into one of my favorite flicks of Sundance 2011.

BELLFLOWER follows two young hipsters, Woodrow (Evan Glodell) and Aiden (Tyler Dawson), who live in a less-than-safe-neighborhood in a world where nobody has to work - Never-Never Land for the baby boom generation. They spend their time drinking heavy amounts of alcohol and building flamethrowers and MAD MAX-inspired cars just in case a global apocalypse happens. If a war broke out, you wouldn’t want to be caught against their gang, “Mother Medusa.” During a night of binge drinking at a local bar, Woodrow meets the rebellious Milly (Jessie Wiseman). They soon embark on a short adventure together, and gallop straight towards that big colorful love rainbow. Hold the brakes, though - this is not a love story. In fact, this is a tale of violent revenge. Unlike BLUE VALENTINE and (500) DOS, BELLFLOWER is told in a linear order. We do have flashbacks during key moments in the film, but these flashbacks cut with the current situation only make the present all the more disturbing. Evan Glodell is the perfect example of true independent cinema auteur. He not only wrote, directed, starred, produced, and edited BELLFLOWER, he also built the cars, the flame thrower, and one-of-a-kind camera to shoot the film with. Heads up, James Cameron, Glodell is closely following your footsteps. I can’t fathom what this guy could do with a budget and complete freedom. Darling newcomer Jessie Wiseman is a natural on screen. Seeing how much the camera loves her, it’s hard to believe this is her first film. Wiseman’s Milly is very sweet and beautiful, but could take your head off if she had to. She’s every man’s dark, twisted fantasy. When you take a look around at all the trash that gets made, giving up hope on Hollywood seems to be the unpleasant choice. Call it a cinematic apocalypse. Then in comes Glodell, grabbing the wheel of creativity to steer us back in his Medusa to a land of new hope.

Grade: B+

2011 Video Interview: BEGINNERS writer/director Mike Mills

Grief. This is the one adjective which brought Mike Mills’ BEGINNERS to life. I spoke with Mills last week at SXSW on behalf of BEGINNERS, which is very personal take on the last five years of his father’s life. Over the last three years of covering interviews for GATW, I’ve learned this: directors are the most intriguing people to speak to. I know this is a pretty idiotic observation as it’s fairly obvious (there’s so much picking you can do at a person’s brain who’s made a film), but as I’ve grow with this site, my conversations with filmmakers are starting to get more interesting and sometimes much more personal. In this interview, Mills opens up about the process of making this film, which was difficult considering its subject. Check it out after the break. Also, check out Mill’s blog where he recaps his SXSW adventure in a two minute video.

Welcome to the Outback, 2010: The year Australia took over Hollywood

Pay attention, Hollywood - Australia has a message for you: revenge is a dish best served cold. When it comes to this claim, I need only point to you towards four of this year’s films from the Outback: Sean Byrne’s ultra-violent love story, THE LOVED ONES, David Michôd's super badass Aussie version of POINT BREAK - ANIMAL KINGDOM, and Nash Edgerton's THE SQUARE, which shows that when good people make bad decisions, things will get uncontrollably messy. Before I kick things off, I also want to recognize two films: Patrick Hughes's RED HILL, and Spencer Susser's HESHER, which premiered at this year's Sundance Film Festival. Susser is part of Blue Tongue Films, along with Michôd and Edgerton's writer/actor Joel, and writer/director/actor Nash. You could classify this collective of talent the badass-and-not-at-all-bratty Brat-Pack. They mesh together behind and in front of the camera. RED HILL is the ultimate revenge flick. Its tagline even suggests, “Revenge just rode into town.” All we know is there is a guy that looks like a fried Anton Chigurh who just broke out of a maximum security prison and is after a veteran sheriff. This lone wolf is not afraid of death, and he spends a vast majority of the film hunting for the sheriff and his goons in the titular small town of Red Hill. Aiding the sheriff is newcomer Shane Cooper (True Blood's Ryan Kwanten), who’s just trying to find a place of peace for him and his pregnant wife. Blood is splattered, truths are unfolded, and a jukebox full of good rock music leads the pissed off man to people’s graves. 

HESHER stars some of the best young Hollywood actors working today - Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Natalie Portman - and they only up the awesome factor of this film.  Gordon-Levitt broke from his clean childhood stardom into an excellent - and here, very disturbing - leading man. You may have seen Susser’s short on the Internet at one point in your life, I LOVE SARAH JANE. Susser is that director that understands what teen angst really is (absent-minded, violent, raw, confusing) and projects it very well on-screen. This article first began its baby steps when I watched Byrne’s THE LOVED ONES back in April for the Dallas International Film Festival. I remember the day Rusty (Gordon) brought the screener over and asked me to watch it ASAP and call him right after. The only thing I knew about the film was its title - nothing else. What I was about to find out was this film was going to smack everything I’ve seen this year upside the head and become my number one film of the year - and it was only April. For the entire duration of THE LOVED ONES, I was on the edge of my dear friend’s couch, heart pounding in chest, with my eyes super glued to the TV. This film gave a new meaning to Chase Whale’s movie-watching experience. There are batshit crazy people in this world, and THE LOVED ONES pushes the realistic terror of those types of people. Throw all your emotions out the door, because this one will take it all out of you. Next up: ANIMAL KINGDOM (which also premiered at Sundance and won the Dramatic Grand Jury Prize award). It’s a dog eat dog world and ANIMAL KINGDOM shows exactly what we humans will sometimes do when we’re backed in a corner and our animal instincts kick in. To paint a better picture for you, my wonderful reader, I compared this to one of the best  - and most quotable -  U.S. crime classics of the 90s, POINT BREAK. What we’re dealing with in ANIMAL KINGDOM is cops versus robbers. Good guys versus. bad guys. Good guys become bad guys - bad guys become good guys. Everyone does whatever they can to survive. Dog. Eat. Dog. You can take that to the bank. Or rob it. The last, but certainly not the squarest, is Nash Edgerton’s directorial debut, THE SQUARE (co-written by and starring his brother, Joel). His short film SPIDER first gained him all sorts of positive buzz around the Internet geek world. Have you seen it? It’s really fucked up. Then he made THE  SQUARE, which displays the trials and tribulations of a once-good married man who chances life to run away with someone else; the two plan a rotten scheme to be together to make that happen. You’re very smart, so you already know things don’t exactly spread out the way they want. Things go from bad to worse, to no turning back. It’s a very enlightening look at how people pay no mind to the actual consequences of the bad judgments they put themselves into. Almost nothing will stay hidden – or in THE SQUARE’s case, buried – forever. Below are links to all the coverage we have done for these films. I really hope you enjoy reading and watching these, along with this article: Interview: THE LOVED ONES writer/director Sean Byrne THE LOVED ONES review Video Interview: ANIMAL KINGDOM actor Ben Mendelsohn Video Interview: ANIMAL KINGDOM writer/director David Michôd ANIMAL KINGDOM review Video Interview: THE SQUARE director Nash Edgerton THE SQUARE review Video Interview: RED HILL writer/director Patrick Hughes and actor Ryan Kwanten RED HILL review

Cannes 2011 Video Interview: BEAR co-writer/director Nash Edgerton

BEAR carries the same hilariously shocking tradition as SPIDER; Jack (played by co-writer/director Nash Edgerton) has good intentions with his pranks on his girlfriend Emelie (Teresa Palmer) but doesn’t have a filter with them and he winds up facing unplanned painful consequences. Edgerton started his career out as a stuntman, and these two films have a heavy influence on that trade. As I’ve said before, I love everything that Edgerton and his crew Blue-Tongue Films have made so interviewing him about BEAR just made sense. We caught up a few days before the festival ended at Screen Australia to talk about BEAR, the possibility of a SPIDER feature, and what he’s working on next. Check out the interview after the break. 

Big thank you to Raffi Asdourian from The Film Stage for shooting this interview for me.

Top 10 of 2011

Here’s my top 10 of 2011! Films highlighted in blue have reviews linked to them. In parenthesis is where/how I saw the film. Enjoy!

U.S Theatrical Releases: 

TAKE SHELTER (Sundance)

DRIVE (Cannes)

SUBMARINE (TIFF)

RUBBER (Fantastic Fest)

ATTACK THE BLOCK (SXSW)

HESHER (Sundance)

MELANCHOLIA (Cannes)

BEATS, RHYMES & LIFE: THE TRAVELS OF A TRIBE CALLED QUEST (Sundance)

I SAW THE DEVIL (Sundance)

SHAME (DVD)

Honorable Mentions: 

50/50 (Theatrical)

BELLFLOWER (Sundance)

TUCKER AND DALE VS. EVIL (Blu-ray)

PARIA (DVD - Premiered at Sundance)

ELITE SQUAD 2 (Fantastic Fest)

EXPORTING RAYMOND (Austin Film Festival)

MIDNIGHT IN PARIS (Theatrical)

Dishonorable Mention:

John Carpenter’s THE WARD (TIFF)

Best Unreleased/Undistributed Films:

OSLO, AUGUST 31ST (Cannes)

BREATHING (Cannes)

SNOWTOWN (Cannes)

HEADHUNTERS (Fantastic Fest)

WORST MOVIE OF 2011 AND PROBABLY FOREVER:

DIRTY GIRL (TIFF)

I Don't Agree With You, Idiot: Thoughts on Internet Trolls

This morning I got an alert from Google telling me I was mentioned somewhere on the Internet. Naturally, I clicked on the link so I could read what nice or horrifying things were said.

In this case, it was an article posted by my pal Russ Fischer over at /Film discussing first reactions after the Cannes Film Festival world premiere of Nicolas Winding Refn’s Drive.

If you follow me on Twitter, you may remember that when I first saw the film, I was very conflicted. I had never walked out of a film completely confused by how I thought about it.Drive drove me crazy. After six glasses of chocolate milk and a “Drive Pros and Cons” list, I realized that I did love 85 percent of the movie dearly — I just had a few somewhat major issues with it. The good outweighed the bad and I gave the film a glowing review.

Read the full article on The Mixmaster.

Interviewed by Yahoo! Movies

Read the full article at Yahoo! Movies.

Video Interview: Philip Seymour Hoffman

At Sundance 2010, I interviewed Philip Seymour Hoffman or his directorial debut, JACK GOES BOATING. Watch the interview at Gordon and the Whale.

Cannes 2011

Video Interview: Writer and Director Joe Cornish and Actor John Boyega talk ATTACK THE BLOCK

This weekend, I need you to stop playing FIFA on Playstation and head to the Alamo Drafthouse South Lamar. There’s an alien invasion movie opening, it’s called ATTACK THE BLOCK, and you must see it. Trust.

Set in the UK, ATB follows a group of misfite teenagers in South London who get the unfortunate luck of having to save their neighborhood from a pack of very, very hungry aliens. It’s sci-fi meets witty humor with a killer score by Basement Jaxx. It’s awesome meets badass.

Last week I sat down with writer and director Joe Cornish (left) and actor John Boyega (right) to discuss “Attack the Block.” Among the things we talk about in the interview, Cornish discusses the proces of nailing down the perfect creature design. Like me, Cornish has a heavy love for 80s sci-fi films like GREMLINS and CRITTERS. 

Also, advance apologies for the bulk use of white flashes during the interview; the tapes the interview was shot on were damaged, and I did my best make it look clean. Enjoy!

ATTACK THE BLOCK is playing exclusively at the Alamo Drafthouse South Lamar starting this Friday. Again, you must see it - it’s the best movie of the summer bruv, believe it.

Watch the interview on CultureMap.

Video Interview: Director Michael Rapaport talks BEATS, RHYMES & LIFE: THE TRAVELS OF A TRIBE CALLED QUEST

Michael Rapaport has really sweetened his life in Hollywood. I’ve been watching movies he’s co-starred in since junior high. It wasn’t until he headlined in the really underrated dark comedy Special that he showed the world the talent he carries.

That wasn’t enough for Rapaport as this year he premiered his directorial debut, the documentary Beats, Rhymes & Life: The Travels of a Tribe Called Quest, at the 2011 Sundance Film Festival. No stranger to the hip hop community, Rapaport has worked on albums with Talib Kwali and the High & Mighty, and has appeared in numerous music videos.

Check out the video interview after the break, where we chat about all things Beats, Rhymes & Life, including the pressures of making a faithful documentary about the four guys in A Tribe Called Quest who’ve been through a lot together.

Watch the interview on CultureMap.

That'll Do, Whale: My thoughts on closing down Gordon and the Whale

​If you read Gordon and the Whale, then you already know that next month will be our last month as a functioning daily website. I announced the news at 10 a.m.
Monday.

I’d be lying if I said I didn’t cry — a lot — and listen to Journey’s “Don’t Stop Believin’” — on repeat. Luckily I had enough tissue to dry said tears and ice cream to not-quite-fill the emotional void when I clicked “Publish.”

For days following the announcement my Twitter, email, and Facebook were flooded with the most heartwarming and encouraging messages I’ll probably ever receive in my life. Turns out, our readers truly believed in the voices behind GATW and how we endeavored to shape the way people think about movies. They had faith in our honesty and passion in discussing all things film. It’s very touching to know that all the blood, sweat and tears spent on GATW has paid off.

Read the full article on Dallas Observer’s The Mixmaster.

Retrospective Interview: Jean-Claude Van Damme

There are three actors in this world who I will always have an adoration for, and Jean-Claude Van Damme happens to be one of them. Growing up, I was a scrawny kid who got his ass-kicked a lot and Van Damme helped me escape to the fantasy world and believe that one day I’d grow up to be just like him - big, tough, non-shit taker. That day never came but I still loved all the films he made pre-STREET FIGHER. It wasn’t until JCVD that Van Damme got back to what he initially seemed to have lost, his passion for film.

Two weeks ago I was asked if I wanted to interview Van Damme on behalf of his latest film, ASSASSINATION GAMES. After punch-dancing my happiness (I’m serious, that really happened), I did an interview with him via email. Unlike a lot of the straight-to-DVD movies he has done in the past, ASSASSINATION GAMES has some heart to it. In the film, Van Damme plays a lone assassin who teams up with another gun for hire (played by Scott Adkins) to take down a vicious mob boss. 

Among the things we talk about in the interview, I got Van Damme to open up about his brilliant and somewhat candid performance of himself in JCVD, why his last few films haven’t had his signature moves, and where his career is heading. 

Read the full interview on Twitch Film.

A Whale of a Time: Saying goodbye to GordonandtheWhale.com

Well, this is the hardest article I’ll ever have to write, but it has to be done. Next month, Gordon and the Whale will be closing its digital doors as a daily website. You will be able to access our archived articles, but come August 31st, there will no longer be fresh content.

I know this may come as a shock, so let’s take a look back and celebrate how far GATW has come and discuss the future. I’m going to give you the abridged version because, well, hopefully most of you reading this have been following us for a long time.

Back in 2007, Rusty Gordon and I had an idea to start a website that would be based solely on us filming ourselves arguing over whatever movie we just saw. If you’ve ever been around Rusty and I together, you know our humor towards each other is both loving and morbid. I pitched this idea to my cousin, who went to school for web design, and he told me he’d build us a site if we were truly serious about the idea. All we needed was a name. Thus, GordonandtheWhale.com was born - a website that sounded like a children’s book but read like two guys who hated each other. It was all out of love, really.

Once the site got rolling, we’d see every film that opened on that Friday and would have our video or written reviews up by Sunday. It was expensive, but we did it because we loved it.

Then everything changed. We were discovered by a well-respected publicist in Dallas, TX. She enjoyed our wit, humor, and style and brought us on as press, meaning we’d get to see movies for free and before they opened. This allowed us to actually get our reviews up in a timely fashion. To add icing to that cake, we also started getting invited to do interviews with actors and directors coming to town - GATW’s very first was William Fichtner.

A few months later, studios started adding us to their press lists, and we eventually began sponsoring advance screenings, giving away passes. More interview opportunities with bigger talent started coming our way. It was pretty kick-ass and I thought that was what “making it” as a movie website was all about.

THE VERY FIRST RESERVED SEATING SIGN FOR GATW

Around Christmas of 2008, we brought on James Wallace; he was a bright and persistent young man and, to this day, I’ve never met anyone more passionate about film than him. When we brought on James, well, that’s when things started to really happen for us. Because of him, GATW eventually became studios’ largest sponsor for the Dallas-Fort Worth area - James gave us a visual presence behind all that wit and humor. He is the guy who loves being in front of a large crowd and can handle both hecklers and eager movie geeks.

We eventually attended our first film festival together - SXSW - and that’s when we discovered a whole other world of movie blogging.

GATW’S FIRST FESTIVAL TOGETHER

In April 2009, we brought on Kate Erbland (you can read Kate’s very first review HERE), who forever changed the way GATW would write. Since that April, Kate has copy edited almost every piece of work posted on GATW, making sure our grammar was correct and that we didn’t sound like complete idiots (half-idiots is okay by Internet standards). You see, Kate’s really smart and has a degree in English - I dropped out of college to chase this whole movie blogging dream and didn’t pay too much attention in school about grammar and punctuation, which was now a crucial part of my life.

Kate began writing reviews for us and eventually became our head film critic. Anyone who has steadily followed Kate’s film criticism career will agree that she can hold her own against any other online film critic working today. It was through her writing that I learned how to capture the feeling of fun in film criticism, whether it be positive or negative. Go ahead and take this time to read one of her reviews and you’ll see exactly what I’m talking about - you’ll have as much fun reading it as she did writing. I suggest either STAR TREK orCLASH OF THE TITANS.

In 2010, I applied and got accepted into the Dallas-Fort Worth Film Critics Association, I then later moved to Austin’s Austin Film Critics Association. By asking for advice and criticism on my work, I became a real writer. At the 2010 Austin Film Festival, I was on a film criticism panel with Dallas Morning News’ Chris Vognar, Film School Rejects’ Neil Miller,The New Yorker's David Denby, and the Los Angeles Times’ Kenneth Turan. I was beyond honored to be a part of this - it was one of the greatest moments of my life.

It wasn’t until James attended CineVegas (RIP) that the Internet started to pay attention to us. It was there that we got our first official EXCLUSIVE which major sites picked up. Soon after that, other news stories and original content began to show up on other websites.

In September 2009, James, Rusty, and I attended Fantastic Fest. We stayed in a tiny one bedroom hotel room with four other guys, and we had the best time of our lives. Life was pretty easy then. We’d use vacation time for festivals, see movies months before they were released, and dream about the day we could do this full-time.

And then another huge turning point happened in GATW’s career - we got accepted into the Sundance Film Festival. As nerdy as it was, I couldn’t decide which I was more excited about: getting accepted or being asked by Film School Rejects’ Neil Miller, Slash Film’s Peter Sciretta, and First Showing’s Alex Billington to room with them during the festival. Kate had covered the LA Film Festival before, but tail-ended Sundance with us. It was no longer just three misfit boys going together to festivals, but one damn talented girl was now fully a part of the bunch.

Kate eventually became a very integral part of GATW, helping James and I make huge decisions on how we would structure our site. We started getting people from all over the world wanting to write for us and finally had a large staff. Life got pretty awesome - through GATW I was able to cover the Toronto International Film Festival and Cannes (with News Editor Joshua Brunsting). GATW even had a sponsor who paid for Josh and my trip to cover Cannes. Holy shit. Where do you go after that?

One thing I haven’t mentioned yet about our site - mainly because it’s not my primary focus of this article - is our financial success, how we ran as a business and paid for festivals. You see, a large number of people see the cool things we get to do and immediately assume there’s a lot of money involved. Let me be the first to tell you - there’s not. With the exception of two festivals, we paid everything out of pocket. Hotels, plane tickets, and food money all came out of our personal bank accounts. At first it was okay - we had faith that one day GATW would be able to pay for it - but it eventually took a toll on everyone.

We did sign with a large ad revenue company, Gorilla Nation, but that financial success never came. We did make a little bit of money off the site, but not enough to pay the writers, or even the editors. Our money went to our server and that was that. After four years of doing some of the biggest and best things with GATW, James, Kate, and I decided it’s best to leave at its peak and pursue other career opportunities. Kind of like what Jerry Seinfeld did with Seinfeld - quit while we’re on top.

Trust me, this isn’t easy for anyone here. Letting go of this site is the hardest thing any of us could do, but if there’s a good time to let go, it’s right now.

Thank you all of the people who were consistent in their support of us throughout all of our trials and tribulations, the ones who believed in us, and the ones who helped carry us to the places we end up post-GATW life. I could name everyone individually, but the Academy would turn up the music and I wouldn’t be able to finish. The ones who I am speaking of, you know exactly who you are - I love you with all of my heart and you will forever be a large impact on my life. Thank you.

I will continue working in the film industry; look for that announcement soon. If you’ve been paying any attention to James Wallace on Twitter, you’ll notice he’s started his own site,IHeartCinema.net, which will fill the void of advance screenings and other sponsored film events that GATW hosted. As for Kate Erbland, well, I’m told she has a pretty groovy announcement coming soon. Check out the comments to see the rest of GATW’s staff members discussing where you can find their work.

This last paragraph is dedicated to my mother, who, since day one, believed I could take my idea of writing about movies online and turn it into something great, and everyone who was ever a part of GATW. Thank you from the bottom of my heart for shedding tears with me and fighting so diligently until the very end. You are the reason I got a taste of hope. Go forth and conquer, my friends.

GATW’s fearless leader and your friendly neighborhood movie geek,

Chase Whale

Below are some of my favorite photos captured in GATW’s career, quotes pulled from one of our reviews, and wonderful articles written about us. I am super-proud of everyone who helped me make this site possible.

From the GATW Archives: Theatrical Review: KILL THE IRISHMAN

Rating: 3/5

Writers: Jonathan Hensleigh (screenplay), Jeremy Walters(screenplay), Rick Porrello(book, To Kill the Irishman)
Director: Jonathan Hensleigh
Cast: Ray Stevenson, Christopher Walken, Vincent D’Onofrio, Val Kilmer, Linda Cardellini

It’s going to take a lot more than firecrackers to kill Danny Greene. You see, the firecrackers he’s referring to are the car bomb rigs that just exploded in his car - as he was driving it. Luckily for this tall drink of water, the radio started shorting out moments before, alerting Mr. Greene to stop, drop, and roll out of his car before physics placed his body all over the street. Greene isn’t a wanted man all over, in fact he has respect from most people in his area.

In the beginning, Greene confidently worked his way up to the top of the worker’s union at a dock in Cleveland. Shortly after, through shady dealings and scare tactics, Greene became one of the top mob bosses the city had to offer. But as you probably already know, nothing stays good in a gangster’s paradise and a bad deal gone horribly wrong sets this true story of violence and betrayal in full-throttle.

Ray Stevenson stars as Danny Greene, the titular Irishman whose rise to fame gave the true meaning of “more money, more problems.” The film was directed by Jonathon Hensleigh, who co-wrote the screenplay based off the book To Kill The Irishman: The War that Crippled the Mafia. Funny story: the two have both worked on a PUNISHER film (Hensleigh co-wrote and directed THE PUNISHER starring Thomas Jane; Stevenson starred in THE PUNISHER: WAR ZONE), so neither are strangers to violent cinema. Stevenson looks identical to the real Danny Greene (all the way up to his missing patches of hair), and if that man was as confident and ruthless as Stevenson plays him, well then, Stevenson has done a great job here. The real Greene was not only street smart, he was also book smart (he was known compulsively read novels) and Stevenson crafted his character to look like more than just a meathead ready to kick your ass.

KILL THE IRISHMAN is populated by a lot of mobsters, but the most notable are Christopher Walken and Vincent D’Onofrio; Val Kilmer shows up as the plump detective Mandiski hot on Greene’s dirty trail. Walken’s full potential is pretty much wasted, as he’s not in the film for very long, but it’s D’Onofrio who almost steals the show by channeling his psychotic characters from previous films as Greenes’ literal partner-in-crime, John Nardi.

The problem with KILL THE IRISHMAN is the attempts to actually kill the Irishman. Less than two minutes in to IRISHMAN, someone tries to kill our titular character (definitely the coolest-looking attempt in the film, too), but after that, the majority of the film is Greene’s rise to the top. It feels like only a small portion of the film is the gangster’s version of cat-and-mouse shoot-em-up. In these scenes, however, a lot of cars blow up,  a lot of people die, and a lot of blood is shed.

What I loved and appreciate about IRISHMAN is how Hensleigh knots the real story with the fictional feature. After a mobster is guaranteed to not show up in any sequel this film could have, the film cuts to the actual news footage of that assassination; after there is an unsuccessful attempt on Greene’s life, we’re shown the actual interview with Greene shortly after what happened. If nothing else, KILL THE IRISHMAN should be appreciated as an important look at the way Greene affected the mob and crimes back in the late 70s.