| Snatch | |
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For a mediocre comedy, Snatch comes at a high price. I realize that in the cynical po-mo universe of Tarantino, True Romance, and Snatch, any moral question is fundamentally unfunny and terminally unhip, but I found this film to be extremely ugly. It's an orgy in over-the-top violence where hardly a scene goes by where nothing gets smashed, shot up, or, alas, eaten by pigs. It's the kind of film where people get run over for laughs and a shot in the head is as inconsequential as blowing your nose. (Any resemblance to concentration camp commander Amon Goth from Schindler's List, I am sure, is purely coincidental.) All of this, to what end? Cruelty and violence have their place in movies, but if it's there for no reason other than that it's "cool," I object.
Richie never gets around to establishing anything like a worthwhile character. Just as in Lock, Stock, I simply couldn't give a damn about anybody. In the end, there's a lot of corpses and somehow, the diamond changed ownership. So what? Who cares? There's nothing at stake but the sense of hipness that pervades everything. I can't shake the suspicion that all the frantic cuts and the gimmicky pyrotechnics serve only one purpose: to conceal the emptiness underneath a dazzling surface. There simply isn't anything here that makes this movie worth watching.
In the end, what's really on display is not any character in the film or anything that happens to them but Guy Ritchie himself. "Looky here," he says, "how goddamn clever I am. There's more blood, quicker edits, and viler curses than in any other film you've ever seen, so I win."
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| Foolish gangsters with squeaking dog - that's just hilarious! |
I won't deny that Ritchie is a talented filmmaker. But every shot in Snatch speaks of his own cleverness-- you can hardly watch the movie because of all the ego that's evident on screen. (Maybe I'd have the same problem if I just got married Madonna.) My advice is: let somebody else write your next screenplay, somebody who understands something about character and story. There are many directors who are one-trick ponies, but bloody comedies about gangsters is one genre where it's hard to continuously top yourself. What's next, watching the butcher do his job? "Faces of Death: The Musical?" America's Funniest Snuff Videos?
Guy Ritchie is the most popular kid in class, and Snatch can expect much success. Don't be bullied: shooting people isn't nearly as cool as he makes it look.
