Revolver (2005)

Best movie of this year hands down!

One of my all time favorites.

what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.

The joyful confection is coated in a sparkly gloss, bright enough to gleam from the darkest, most cynical corners.

The movie opens with Jason getting out of prison. The opening line sets the tone for the movie "One thing I've learned in the last seven years: in every game and con there's always an opponent, and there's always a victim. The trick is to know when you're the latter, so you can become the former."There is a lot of first person narration by Statham. If the first few minutes we know he is being scammed and will somehow turn the scam on his scammers. The story becomes, who is scamming who? There are a lot of criminals and tough guys in this casino based story. Ray Liotta plays a casino manager/crime boss who has placed a hit on Jason, while bad guy Vincent Pastore plays a loan shark who protects Jason...for a price. Jason knows he is being conned, but what is it? How does he recover?The soundtrack is good and a constant throb. Statham's narration becomes a little annoying, but it is a major part of the film. There were a few times I thought I was watching Tarantino, especially with the cartoons. This is not your typical Statham, wears the shades, jumps on roof tops action film. It has none of that. As the film progresses, it get weirder. I would love to give you a spoiler review, except I wasn't sure I understood the ending. Good Luck.F-bomb, brief nudity

I'll give it a 9 because of all the ways possible to interpret and perceive the events and meanings in this movie. I do not know why but what I see in this movie is 2 self-educated genii exploiting entire mob gangs governed by morons and self-proclaimed leaders of the mob world. Jack Green in this story is just a pieces moved on real life chess board. It was quite clear that Avi and Zach are Jack's neighbors next door from solitary prison cells. They knew everything about him, stole everything he had when they escaped prison and did whatever they do to stay in a shadow and control environment without being notices. When Jack leaves prison, makes money and gets targeted by the owner the casino they magically appear and offer help. Somehow they now every step taken by the casino owner and gets few moves ahead of everyone. Intercepts assassination of Jack and then convinces him that he has got a disease so he loses common sense and stops thinking rationally. He gives them all of his money which are lent to a bunch of desperate people who think that they will be able to give the money back but obviously they can't. So they end up in Loan Shark pocket enslaving themselves. So Jack is now one their puppets, their assets. Later on these 2 genii carry on manipulation by creating the image of so called Mr Gold which becomes a real real big boss in the eyes of Macha. So Macha tries everything to satisfy this mysterious figure. He fears to turn down the mythical being so much that he decides to pay ridiculous money for his competition in exchange for white powdery stuff. Well, we all saw how well it went. And it would be naive to disregard mastermind power of these to criminals who know where when and how enemy is going to act in a certain situation. They are the ones behind everyone's misfortune including Mr Green's. The real big bosses are smoking cigars in a Jacuzzi when stupid gangsters chase the wrong guy. Literally, the whole story is an ingenious design of Mr black magic a.k.a. Avi and put into practice by the practical engineer Zach. If you do the math, Avi and Zach do not exist in the eyes of neither Macha, nor Lord John. All the blame is pushed onto Mr Green since he was scamming everyone before no one would expect anyone else to be involved. These 2 get the money for the powder and the powder itself. The gang war starts, assassination of Macha fails so they make Mr Green to hand in Lord John's powder to Macha himself. In this way Macha is certainly dead since the owners of Lord John will not forget that Macha stole their powder and brought a shame to clan. So Macha understood that is f*ked and blew his head off because bullet in his brain is much better than an upcoming bad fate from Asian mafia.You might try to see some Ego issues in MrGreen's personality but the only one who had an enormous Ego was Macha. Look at his palace, items at home, sick attention to perfection - he takes full body tan in a huge room, criticizes a professional sniper, really??? Anyway all of these mobsters think they are in control but the real control comes from 2 unnoticed puppeteers.

As others have stated, it might not be the best of its kind (movies with many layers that are hard to read or even to fully comprehend with just one watch), but it's still more than solid. If you don't like a movie that is not just entertainment (which is OK), there are other places to look for that. Guy Ritchie did "Lock, Stock ..." and "Snatch" and other movies who are more on the entertainment side, but with this, he tried (and imo succeeded) to add depth to that.And Mr. Ritchie knows what the story is (even if some viewers might think and feel different), which is clear in his audio commentary for the movie. What will not become too clear, is what the movie is about. That is a personal experience and you yourself might be the your enemy - to liking this movie ...

I do not write many reviews on here, for practical reasons, but I felt so compelled to for this. How wrong the critics (some of which I respect and admire) were. This is a review for the UK cut (fully loaded DVD edition). I avoided this film for so long because of how bad rocknrolla was and the god awful swept away plus the marketing and sleeve design of it too. However I felt redeemed by catching both Sherlock films back to back and I picked up the disc around the same time criminally cheap. So, like everyone probably thought when they first watched it, the first hour or so were filled with terrible dialogue, clichéd typecast performances, (apart from Andre 3000), redeemed by being glossed over with a great soundtrack, slick editing and superb cinematography that I nearly switched off believing everyone's vitriol towards it. However, the second half of the film hit me like a fast moving car. That scene in the restaurant is probably one of the most tense and stylish I've ever seen, especially the sound design (almost as though the co-writer Besson had directed that segment himself) and from there on in the film really threw curveballs and pulled the rug out like From Dusk Till Dawn did. Ah, so this ISN'T a straightforward cockney/American gangster flick! Lost is the tongue in cheek cheekiness of Snatch, which doesn't hurt, and replaced is sheer intelligence that would make Fincher proud. Getting to the end of the film was so rewarding. So much so I wanted to watch it immediately and not many films do that to me! I decided against, for various reasons practically, but I did re-watch the following night and I noticed so many things I missed first time hidden in plain sight through clever filming and editing conventions. A very brave move for Ritchie making this (even to the decision over the end credits) and my hats off to him. I do feel though that if Besson had actually made the film it would be reverred, no criticism at all about Ritchie's style just that some of the dialogue at the beginning was very cringeworthy. Hence my 9/10, even though I wanted to give it 10. Also worthwhile watching for Statham's best ever performance. Keen to see the U.S. cut now (why does this even have to happen producers? - you've only got it right once with Donnie Darko) but I've heard it's butchered. Ritchie's best film to date and true film art. This film would happily sit in a collection nestled inbetween The Limey, Gangster Number 1, Mulholland Drive, Fight Club and American Psycho.