Review of The Boondock Saints II: All Saints Day (2009) by Charity M — 24 Sep 2010

When I started to watch Troy Duffyâ??s The Boondock Saints 2: All Saints Day, I was excited. After seeing the first film about six or seven months ago, I was still in awe of how inspired and original the 1999 release was. The action was well choreographed, the violence within the film felt natural despite the fact that it could very easily have come off as being forced, and the acting choices were perfect. I loved every minute of the first film and was excited to see the second installment.

Unfortunately, ten years may have been too long a wait between films, or maybe Duffy was just never that talented to begin with. Either way, The Boondock Saints 2 was just not a good movie. In fact, it barely even resembles a movie. Many of the sequences feel awkward and just donâ??t make sense within the film at all, the dialogue was often clumsy, and the saints just donâ??t really have the same it factor that they did in the first movie.

To go into specifics, a lot of the added characters seem to be what really dragged the film down. The introduction of a new ally to replace Rocco while valid in theory, just didnâ??t play out well. The character of Romeo, played by Clifton Collins Jr., may have been the worst part of the whole film. Why couldnâ??t the saints have just gone solo in this movie? Theyâ??re certainly good enough just by themselves. Why introduce a new character who just makes you wish that Rocco hadnâ??t been killed off in the first film? Quite frankly, I spent the whole time watching the movie just hoping that Romeo would get killed.

The only character worse than Romeo was the Faux-Southern Eunice, played by Dexterâ??s Julie Benz. The fakeness of her accent alone was bad enough, but what was worse was the fact that Duffy kept filming sequences of Benz walking slowly towards the camera, while a gunfight ensued around her, and her hair blew in the breeze. And this wasnâ??t just a one-time occurrence, it happened several times. It just made it seem that Benzâ??s character was only there as eye candy, which she probably was, but Duffy could have at least disguised that a little bit, instead of playing off of that fact. Most of her scenes just came off feeling like commercials for womenâ??s conditioner.

The only really interesting part of the film was the flash back sequences telling the origins of Bill Connollyâ??s character Poppa, and the final confrontation between Poppa and his nemesis The Roman, played by Peter Fonda, at least until the bullets came back in.

In conclusion, Troy Duffyâ??s long awaited sequel to the cult-hit success of his 1999 release of The Boondock Saints is a complete piece of cinematic drivel. The plot feels recycled from numerous other action movies, the new characters are simply annoying, and the things that were so great about the first movie are no where to be found. The only reason a person can have for possibly enjoying this film is because they are a fan of the first film. With the The Boondock Saints 2, Troy Duffy has created a movie that is enjoyable for fans of the original, but is a complete waste of time for anyone else.