Review of Kill the Irishman (2011) by Maksim B — 24 Apr 2011

Kill the Irishman is one of the most interesting and captivating biopics released lately, which only proves that what it takes to make a wonderful movie is not always a huge budget, but simply an extremely intriguing character, great actors and slick direction.

All of this is excellently blended in this 70s based mob-drama about a charismatic and a bit crazy Irish guy who raised from nothing and brought a US town upside-down, which eventually led to a nation-wide disaster for the Italian mafia. The story is raw, fast-paced and mob violence scenes are in excess. Among this action, director Jonathan Hensleigh manages to bring up moral dilemmas and questions which neither create positive portrait of Danny Greene, nor a negative one, keeping the movie not too biased, or becoming too dramatic.

What really differs Kill the Irishman from the most of the other gangster movies is not its outstanding cinematography, brought to a wonderful perfection, but the mesmerizing performance of Ray Stevenson. Charismatic, crazy and bold, Stevenson becomes a brilliantly convincing embodiment of the real Danny Greene.

This wonderful performance has probably influenced director Hensleigh, as he fails to develop the characters from the supporting cast and this could have given a further detailed overview of these turbulent Cleveland years. Some positive nods should be awarded to Val Kilmer, but as the rest he is left without enough attention by the camera.

This of course, does not change the fact that Kill the Irishman is one of the freshest mob-movies brought recently. It is not a classic, but a pleasant surprise among rivers of Hollywood mediocrity.