Last Updated on July 23, 2021
THE BLACK SHEEP is an ongoing column featuring different takes on films that either the writer HATED, but that the majority of film fans LOVED, or that the writer LOVED, but that most others LOATH. We’re hoping this column will promote constructive and geek fueled discussion. Dig in!
THE BOONDOCK SAINTS (1999)
Directed by Troy Duffy
“Everything about the film screams unoriginal.”
Quick confessional. I teach at a small College here in the States. At the start of every semester I ask students to list their favorite movie and why. Six times out of ten, they list one movie: The Boondock Saints. Their reason? It’s so damn cool.
Quick confessional #2. I find The Boondock Saints all style and pure shit. It’s a terrible film, more or less a collage of about 252 other films all of which do a better job. It wants to be so hip, so bloody, so groundbreaking that it fails on all accounts. It strives to outdo anything attempted by Tarantino in terms of style and dialogue. It wants to simultaneously amuse, horrify, and befuddle us. Unfortunately, director/writer Troy Duffy can’t turn out the written word like his idol. He can’t even get close. I applaud the guy for making a film and getting wide distribution, but he didn’t create anything more memorable than the standard issue Steven Seagal movie. But that’s what happens when an artist emulates a style instead of finding their own niche. As a result, I don’t understand the fascination here. I don’t understand its strong fan base. Maybe they love it for its utter ineptness like that last Street Fighter or Plan Nine. Maybe. But I doubt it.
Now the skeptical Black Sheep reader might say that I am a cynic, that I just love to hate. Maybe so (I sure do love to hate. It’s fun. Try it), but Boondock is as generic as anything in the Malt-O-Meal lineup. It’s the Sam’s Choice Cola of action movies, wanting to be funny and clever, but it ain’t. It’s Dr. Thunder to Dr. Pepper. At no time does it feel like an authentic cinematic experience. Granted, a few funny moments pop up here and there, but more often than not the jokes fall flat. Example: the brothers in the hospital shouting profanities in the presence of nuns. Funny maybe on an eighth grade level, but the way Duffy creates the scene reminds more of something out of one of the Cannonball Run flicks than a bloody crime film. The humor, in the way he presents it, does not fit. Out of place and forced, and that can never happen in the crime film. Think about it. The great genre movies all have elements of humor, yet they feel natural in the moment (think Goodfellas “Am I a clown?”). Not forced upon us.
Beyond the few funny moments, I’ll also give a few allowances for what Boondocks does have going for it — namely some great action sequences, most of which happen in slow-mo and set to obnoxious blaring techno. I dig the toilet sequence in particular (the first big action scene) as it as the absurdness of the moment overtakes the story. It works really well with one of the brothers dropping a toilet from a few stories above, jumping down from a roof in a rope and handcuffs, and defeating two armed foes. It’s a great scene. Beyond the action, the best element comes from Willem Dafoe who goes completely off the deep end here. He’s a grand example of excess acting, but who cares? Dude looks like he’s enjoying himself as he recreates murder scenes while listening to opera (complete with his Discman attached to his belt), dresses in drag, and become sweatier the longer the movie rolls. It’s the one unforgettable role even as Dafoe pushes the character to the limit, and then over a Grand Canyon sized cliff.
I can’s dish out the same compliments for the MacManus brothers, played by Sean Patrick Flanery and Norman Reedus, who both drop their Irish accents like a Costner Robin Hood. Neither character feels particularly interesting or memorable beyond their love for God and their affinity for dropping Bible rhymes. They’re the clichéd tough Irish punks without any real nuances. Likewise, the plot just feels stale. The good Catholic boy routine ordained by God to avenge bad people isn’t anything new. Perhaps if the angle of their misguided belief that God did summon them were played up it’d be interesting, but I grew up reading the Punisher, and more or less, it feels lot like that.
To make up for semi-truck full of flaws, Duffy attempts to get all creative on our asses by showing the aftermath of the bloodbath before the wrath occurs. Sure, that might be interesting if this were a mystery movie, but by showing exactly how the MacManus brothers do their good work via reverse flashbacks removes more suspense than it creates. In fact, it ruins any potential story flow. It’s as if Duffy couldn’t decide what exactly he was making, either mystery or exploitation, and essentially leaves Dafoe as the unofficial narrator to make the story clear while the bros unleashes their bloody Christian violence. It doesn’t make narrative sense.
And speaking of sense not being there, we all like Ron Jeremy, but if you’re gonna hire him to act, better make sure he can with his clothes on. Every time he appears on screen in Boondocks, it ruins the moment. It pulls me out. He’s a funny dude and can work in a cameo capacity, but with an actual role? No. Please, no. But perhaps the worst element in acting is the shaggy man Rocco. Dude could be one of the worst actors ever, not to mention one of the most annoying characters. Why the brothers would hang with a man who kills an unarmed bartender and shoves a pistol into the face of women is beyond me. If they are avenging saints, shouldn’t they run with a holier crew? Shouldn’t they kill Rocco based upon their principle?
I should adore Boondock Saints. It’s the genre that I love the most: crime, murder, mayhem. A gritty story that takes place outside of the clichéd New York and LA. It’s about anti-heroes. Hell, it even has Dafoe. But it doesn’t work. Everything about Boondock screams generic. It’s a movie made for folks who haven’t seen enough movies. Folks like my students. Tarantino poops this kind of story out while reading Joblo on his Blackberry. Scorsese’s brain wouldn’t allow him to think this dumb. Howard Hawks would have added some reality and made men of these boys. Troy Duffy isn’t in their league (I’m sure he’d agree. That’s an untouchable list). But he’s not even a Tony Scott or Joe Carnahan. Considering he’s only directed two movies in a decade speaks to that. (Yeah, I understand he’s an independent director and all that.) Just saying…
Disagree? Get the DVD and discover for yourself.
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