This film has received many bad reviews, but not because it's a bad movie. The truth is it's just not what people expected it to be. When you hear about a mafia movie, you expect an epic, inside look like with Goodfellas or Casino, but Gangster Squad is from the cops point of view and more like The Untouchables. Gangster Squad is based on a novel and is about an off the books LAPD operation aimed at bringing down Micky Cohen. In the 1940s, LA had a growing mafia problem on it's hands, and Mickey Cohen was set to become the next Al Capone. Unbeknownst for decades, the LAPD sent a group of cops, who didn't play by the book, after Cohen and by going after his business interests, they attempt to destroy his growing empire. The story is a great one, well deserving of a film adaptation, but what people didn't like was how it turned into an action film. This story has all the makings of an epic mafia drama, an you will be hard pressed to find a better performance than the one Sean Penn gives as Mickey Cohen. It was somewhat disappointing that they didn't get more into Cohen and his operation, but for what it was, it was a great film. As for the cast, it features some of Hollywood's best an brightest as old school meets the up and coming stars of the big screen. Every one from the stars to the ancillary characters give Oscar worthy performances that will be sadly overlooked. because of the nature of the film. If you're looking for a classic mob drama, you're going to be disappointed, but if you want to see an action packed cop movie with a mob element, then Gangster Squad is the film for you.
As the story opens, Mickey Cohen (Sean Penn) is staking out his criminal turf, while most of the police force has been paid to look the other way. The police chief (a grizzled Nick Nolte) taps honest police sergeant John O'Mara (Josh Brolin) to set up an off-the-books gangster squad. With the help of his wife, O'Mara picks five other police officers prepared to take on Cohen and his mob. Among them is Jerry Wooters (Ryan Gosling), O'Mara's army buddy, who also happens to have a very dangerous thing going with Cohen's moll (Emma Stone). The gangster squad gets to work, and Mickey Cohen soon becomes aware that his operation is being dismantled right under his nose. Cohen will come after the gangster squad, and their friends and families, setting up a big finale at an L.A. hotel.
The pacing of the movie is perhaps a little uneven, but its best moments make up for it. The gunfights are pretty exciting, and the movie makes the good guys worry about the collateral damage. Ryan Gosling and Emma Stone are quite good together, as in a different way are Josh Brolin and Mireille Enos, who plays his wife. The movie has an old-fashioned ending, but that is the point. Recommended.
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This is a fictionalized version of the story of LA gangster Mickey Cohen, excellently portrayed by Sean Penn who looks nothing like him. The action takes place in 1949/1950 and is not shot in black and white. Combat veteran Sgt. John O'Mara (Josh Brolin) is asked to form a squad of elite men to take down Mickey Cohen, but not as cops, but as a gangsters hitting his places one by one.John has a pregnant wife (Mireille Enos) who would rather leave town than have her husband take on the mobster. Saddled with the fact it won't happen, she helps her husband assemble a squad which includes Jerry (Ryan Gosling) a playboy cop who is seeing Mickey's girlfriend (Emma Stone). Emma Stone has played too many down to earth women to pull off a swanky mobster girl. She looked like a kid who was playing in her mommy's make-up box. Perhaps that was the genius of the film as she was to suppose to be a small town girl out of place.
Jerry uses a pick up line from 1941 comedy "Hold That Ghost" when he talks about playing post office. Again, was this bad writing or would have someone used a line from a film? At times the characters acted like they came out of "Sin City," stereotypes of themselves. Where do they get all these new Packards to shoot up?
The film had some good lines such as Sean Penn: "All good things must one day be burnt to the ground for insurance money." There is enough humor in the film to keep it from becoming dry.
Now the bad news is that Mickey Cohen was actually brought down by the IRS and not the gangster squad. His girlfriend Liz (not Grace)did three years because she wouldn't testify against him. So as far as facts go, rate this well below an Oliver Stone film. I liked the film, but not because there was any truth to it.
Parental Guide: F-bombs. No sex. Stripper with large pasties.
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This is a violent, bloody R-rated territorial squabble set in the late 1940s between the Los Angeles Police Department and the Mickey Cohen/Bugsy Siegel East Coast Mob. This humor-laced (and bullet-ridden) outing pits East Coast gangsters against ...hmm... not really a Dirty Dozen, more like a Slightly Soiled Six-Pack, of cops who have been anonymously recruited to run organized crime out of Los Angeles.This is a highly fictionalized story inspired by real events. We see:
* Sean Penn ("Milk") is Mickey Cohen, a former professional boxer with a nasty temper, brutal and merciless. I must say, Penn has become a caricature of himself....and he has NEVER learned to enunciate!
* Nick Nolte ("Warrior") is Police Chief Parker, the guy determined to keep Cohen and his cohorts from setting up shop in LA.
* Josh Brolin ("W.") is Sgt. John O'Mara, an Army vet, now a cop for the LAPD. He is hand-picked for the job, and he in turn hand picks his own squad (with some help from his wife).
* Ryan Gosling ("Drive") is Sgt. Jerry Wooters, who first declines the "honor" of serving on the team, but then he gets mad... (with the Hollywoodland real estate development sign shining in the background.)
* Emma Stone ("The Amazing Spider-Man") is Grace, a favorite of Cohen's; Sgt. Wooters likes her, too.... Vintage clothing looks good on this gal!
* Robert Patrick ("Trouble With the Curve") is Max, otherwise known by this little gang as "Hopalong" because a six-gun is his weapon of choice.
* Michael Peña ("End of Watch") is Navidad, who nominates himself to join up when Max is recruited.
* Giovanni Ribisi ("Avatar") is Conway, a technician who is invited into the project because he understands telecommunications...and our geek accepts because he would like to be a hero to his son.
* Anthony Mackie ("The Hurt Locker") is Coleman, the only law in his tough neighborhood. He just wants to stay OUT of Burbank!
* Yvette Tucker ("Me Again") does a perfectly splendid turn as Carmen Miranda, complete with a towering headgear of fruit, singing at Slapsy Maxie's nightclub during a raid.
This shoot-em-up is almost non-stop gunfire interspersed with blowie uppie stuff. There isn't as much profanity as usual, but the vehicular mayhem is sorta fun with those big old 40s vintage cars swaying and lurching around corners.
Be sure to suspend disbelief, but be prepared to laugh more often than you might expect. Despite all the blood and gore, the screening audience was mildly entertained, and that's what it's all about, ...isn't it? ...Maybe? Amazon will notify me when this is available on DVD so I can notify my folks on JayFlix.net.
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A gritty but half-hearted swing at a noir-influenced mob movie, Gangster Squad feels like it should be much better than it actually is. It has the blockbuster cast, the graphic violence and the over-the-top acting to deliver the admirable B-movie goods, but something about Ruben Fleischer's approach turns this into a rather weak sauce.The movie is one of those period pieces, somewhat covering the real life activities of Mickey Cohen and his gang as they worked to dominate Los Angeles in the 1940s and 1950s. The titular team is a group of cops who worked without badges and legal precedent to make life difficult for Cohen and his gang, but their plans are more anarchic than effective.
Sean Penn stars as Cohen, a maniacal mobster and former boxer hell-bent on ruling LA and forcing out his Chicago rivals. The police have been trying to stop him for years, but have been unable to curb his enthusiasm. Enter Chief Bill Parker (Nick Nolte) and his big idea of bringing in a squad to handle Cohen without the use of the law. Parker enlists Sgt. O'Mara (Josh Brolin) to put the crew together.
O'Mara seeks out various personalities, including the womanizing Jerry Wooters (Ryan Gosling), the detective Coleman Harris (Anthony Mackie), the legend Max Kennard (Robert Patrick), and the wire tapper Conway Keeler (Giovanni Ribisi). The crew works to put the screws on Cohen, but their lack of organization and effective planning causes more than a few hitches.
Because it's required in movies like this, there's also a femme fatale in the form of Emma Stone's Grace Faraday. She is Cohen's girlfriend of sorts and represents the forbidden fruit for Wooters, putting the crew in a remarkable position. But like most of the characters of Gangster Squad, she is underdeveloped and uninteresting.
The pile of A-list talent in this 2013 film should be enough to overrule most mistakes in the writing department, at least theoretically, but it just doesn't happen. The reedy, squelchy, obtuse characters are too pitifully flavourless for a movie that boasts the sort of image and violence that Gangster Squad does.
In the right hands, this would have been a quality B-movie. It has the grit and violence to do the job, even if it remains vague when it comes to characterization and overall plot. It could've sunk its teeth in as a reasonable period piece, committed to rehearsing an airborne James Cagney gangster picture.
But in the hands of Fleischer, who brought us Zombieland, this flick thrashes about trying to find its weight. It remains an insignificant instance of being almost there, a short-armed swing at good movie-making that can't quite find its measure. As good as Gangster Squad should be, it just doesn't muster much of interest throughout its 113 minutes.
So sure, this picture boasts the talents of Penn, Brolin and Gosling. And it has some surprising, if not joyful violence. But it wastes its femme fatale storyline with a miscast Stone and flounders around with weak connective tissue, remaining a lumbering and entirely run-of-the-mill effort. It should be better, but it's not.
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