Review of Live by Night (2016) by Mandela W — 24 Jan 2017

Ben Affleck has since gone baby gone proven to be an incredibly skilled director.The Oscar winning Argo, The Town and even a 2008 documenatry Gimme Shelter have all proven to be fine achievements for Mr Affleck. Affleck has unfortunately in the last year appeared in some not so great projects, Batman vs Superman: Dawn of Justice (although he was the only good part of it), Suicide Squad, and The Accountant. Despite some decent acting work and visual display the movie fails to deliver us something extraordinary in the gangster genre.

Joe Coughlin is a 1920's Boston Robber turned Gangster who finds himself on somewhat of a revenge journey as he makes his way to ybor city florida to not only make his way into the bootlegging business down there but to also confront an irish gangster who was responsible for a personal tragedy that went down in his hometown.

As decent and non-terrible as this was, mr Affleck has done better. He utilizes much of the same story telling material from The Town and unfortuntately it hurt the film. This showed his directing ability has its limits. He also could have done away with the narration might have actually improved the story. the script was very shaky and muddied at times. The ending could have used some work. The film actually did not live up to the title. Joe never was living by night he seemed to be suffering more by the cold light of day and so that was a bit disappointing.

The acting was very good on a positive note. Ben Affleck give a decent performance as Joe. Very smooth and as always had presence. Joe never seemed to rattled or distraught by anything that went wrong in his situations. impressive boston accent from Chris Messina. I almost thought he was gonna be the idiot friend in this story but he turned out to be a very intelligent ruthless partner to Joe. Impresisve work here. Chris Cooper and Brendan Gleeson both played father figures in here but they both did an excellent job and showcased their impeccable ability to command the screen no matter how little time they got in a movie. even the ladies sienna miller, Zoe Saldana and Elle Fanning all brought their A game and created such interesting women in this story.

Visually it was fantastic. the costuming was sleek and exquisite for that time in the 1930's. Very impressive lighting and cinematography. Even the sound design was awesome giving it that hard edge feel.

I say it again Mr Affleck has done better so honestly don't even bother with this.