Smokin' Aces (2007) 109 minutes Reviews

Smokin' Aces had a huge marketing push earlier this year. Jeremy Piven hot off all the awards he's deservedly getting playing Ari the obsessive, success driven agent on H.B.O.'s Entourage has a pivotal but rather small role here.    Lots of folks appear in this one:  Ben Affleck, Jason Bateman, Alicia Keys, Ryan Reynolds, Ray Liotta. Peter Berg and Andy Garcia.

The question is why they bothered?   It's a violent, 'feds versus gangsters and hitmen' movie.   Nothing new.. except there's a convoluted (confusing) back-story that sorta' pays off (making an ending that I suppose was going for...

Bottom-Line: As the movie closes one of the characters, banged up and bleeding pleads with another to "Make it make sense."  Too Late!

Written and directed by Joe Carnahan (Narc) Smokin' Aces reaches back into now familiar territory-the Mob-to tell it tale, only this time with a twist at the very end.  Buddy Israel (Jeremy Piven - Ellen, The Larry Sanders Show, Entourage) is a Las Vegas showman gone bad; that is he is attracted more the dark side of the city of perpetual light, than the happy, sunny side.  Now he has turned state's evidence and everyone wants him dead, even his alleged mentor...

An FBI agent hunts for a Las Vegas stand up comic who has decided to squeal on the mob, BUT before he heads off for protective custody, he decides to go to the casinos at Lake Tahoe for one last good time, while drawing a crowd of assassins.

You'll find some pretty decent performances by Alicia Keys among others, but needless to say,  Smokin' Aces has way too much violence, however, if you're a person who likes a lot of blood, then this is the movie for you.

The actors have interesting roles, and the plot has everything to love about it. The killers are interesting, do their jobs in interesting ways, and there are twists and turns galore.

Unfortunately, the film hinges on the big revealed secret at the end. A secret which on the one hand was obvious from the beginning, but when fully explained is completely stupid.

Most of the violence, while gratuitous, serves as good action, but one has to wonder why anyone - especially highly trained FBI agents - would try to return fire with a handgun out a window at a building 1000 yards away. They had to know...

I was expecting the movie that the trailers advertised:  Fast paced extreme violence from the first second to the very end with a simple plot to drive it.  But what I got was a movie that was deeper than that and with about half the fast paced violence I was promised. 

But is this a bad thing?  I have not really figured that out yet.  On one side, I was totally unhappy that I did not get what I wanted when I bought the movie.  On the other, the deeper plot and the surprisingly fair acting was a pleasant surprise.  I had no idea that Ryan Reynolds could actually act (and I'm a fan too!)....