REVIEW: RocknRolla

RocknRolla (2008)

A Guy Ritchie Film

Ever since marrying Madonna some time in the nineties, Guy Ritchie has let his work become infested with the inane mythos of Cabala and the horrible acting of his then-wife, much like Warren Beatty. Now that he's dropped the alligator skin baggage, he's come back into the fictional world that made him famous: The London Crime World.

Unlike previous gangster entry, 'Revolver', RocknRolla jettisons itself onto the screen with snappy dialogue, pitch-black humor, and a bounty of four letter epithets powerful enough to make the FCC spontaneously combust.

The acting is pretty sparky as well. Each character is believable, even those of Mr. Chris 'Ludacris' Bridges and Jeremy Piven work well within the framework of the plot, and the oft generalized cockney thugs seem fresh. The cinematography is jumpy in a good way, throwing in an occasional fancy camera trick amid all the cuts to add some style and flavor. Soundtrack wise, the namesake of the film is well represented with such bombastic tunes as "Rock & Roll Queen" from The Subways and "I'm a Man" from Black Strobe.

Normally, a complex plot would seem to be a draw for a film, espescially for one with aspirations at box office success, but in this case it works. Guy Ritchie succeeds again with a plot of so many interweaving tales that they become circular and thus any action's implications are never immidiate, building suspense the whole way through. In a nutshell, however, it concerns conflict between Old School gangsters from London and New School gangsters from Eastern Europe.

The one draw of the movie is that it is a little too stylistic and lacks a certain depth. However, if one goes to see a Guy Ritchie movie for intellectual provocation they must be ignorant of the world around them or shot up on novacaine.

Were I to sum up the contents of this flick, I'd quote the opening lines:

"People ask the question... what's a RocknRolla? And I tell 'em - it's not about drums, drugs, and hospital drips, oh no. There's more there than that, my friend. We all like a bit of the good life - some the money, some the drugs, other the sex game, the glamour, or the fame. But a RocknRolla, oh, he's different. Why? Because a real RocknRolla wants the f*****g lot."