Review of The Family (2013) by Lewis E — 28 Apr 2014

I've lost my trust for Robert DeNiro films. When was his last really good one? 'Meet the Parents' perhaps but that's still flicking quite far back through the archives. In 'The Family', he plays an ex-mafia boss in witness protection with a bunch of pissed off Italians wanting his bearded head on a spike. Whenever he plays these gangster roles, I always get the underlying feeling he is trying too hard to recapture the glory days of 'Casino' and 'Goodfellas'. These feelings were reinforced when this film made a butt-kissing reference to the later of the aforementioned movies. While he is still a long way off, 'The Family' is certainly not his worse effort. The genre is slightly convoluted with the initial scenes pointing to a family comedy with humour based on shocking violence (cue corny scenes of the two children beating up school bullies), whereas the ending produces a serious tone conveying a strong sense of the family's danger. Consequently, this leads to entertaining and tense, albeit not amazing, confrontation at the climax. The story had decent gangster flick written all over it and with Luc Besson (director of 'Taken' and 'Leon') the potential was there, but for much of the film it felt like the film-makers were trying to have fun rather than create something special.

Possibly a half star too generous so it may get lowered in due time but I'll allow poor old DeNiro for now.