[yasr_overall_rating]
A crew of ex-cons are hired by a Cleveland mafioso to kidnap the baby of a rival mobster.
Paul Schrader has written some of the best movies in film history: “Taxi Driver,” “Rolling Thunder,” “Raging Bull,” “American Gigolo” and “The Last Temptation of Christ.” He is, without a doubt, a very talented and gifted writer. But like so many writers in Hollywood, it was only a matter of time before he set his sights on directing. And why not? As a writer/director myself for the past 3o years, for me, they’ve gone hand in hand and it makes perfect sense, as the creator of a story, and the characters and scenarios that take place within it, who better to direct than the person who ultimately created them? Well, in many cases, that works out, just look at Woody Allen, Quentin Tarantino, James Cameron, Spike Lee, and the list goes on. Sometimes however, while the writer most certainly has the ability to create believable and authentic stories and characters and successfully put them down on paper, bringing them to the screen is a completely different arena. Early on in Paul Schrader’s career, he directed some very auspicious and noteworthy movies, the aforementioned “American Gigolo,” “Patty Hearst” and the brilliant “Affliction,” but over the past ten years or so, he seems to have lost the passion, churning out dreck like “Dominion: Prequel to the Exorcist,” “The Canyons” and 2014’s “Dying of the Light” (which also starred Nicolas Cage). I feel at this point in his career, the smart move would be to stick with writing, and give the directing reins over to some new up-and-coming director but hey, what do I know?
“Dog Eat Dog” tells the story of three ex-cons, Troy (Nicolas Cage), Mad Dog (Willem Dafoe), and Diesel (Christopher Matthew Cook), who have all been in prison numerous times and desperately need money. After a few small jobs, Troy manages to talk El Greco (Paul Schrader), an old friend, into letting them in on a big job, one that will guarantee all three enough money to retire on. They are given the simple task of kidnapping the baby of a rival mobster who owes El Greco money and all they have to do, is hold the baby ransom until the money is paid and once the money is received, the baby and its nanny will be released, simple. But of course, things don’t go according to plan and all three men’s lives will be changed by the unfortunate series of events that are about to transpire.
This is the kind of film that tries too hard to follow in the footsteps of first-rate movies like “The Departed,” “Carlito’s Way,” and “Road to Perdition,” films that take place within the world of the mafia and the seedy underworld but concentrate more on the characters inside that terrain, than on the business itself. Nicolas Cage has had a run of bad luck in recent years but not even this movie can offer him the sort of performance most actors would die for, here, he seems to be going through the motions, never over-exerting himself or truly emoting the way we all know he is capable of. Willem Dafoe is always watchable but here he is reduced to Cage’s second fiddle as Mad Dog, a hoodlum who is constantly indecisive, one minute living up to his nick name, the next, wanting to get out of the game and start fresh along with a family and house in the suburbs. His perpetual erratic behavior is more of an annoyance than a great character arc and you realize that he too, is simply acting and moving mechanically, his involvement in the film probably due to his director’s past achievements. The movie introduces numerous scenarios but instead of focusing on the most relevant ones, we end up following those which are insignificant and meaningless, leaving us to wonder had the film followed the bigger picture, maybe we would have gotten a better one. I guess we’ll never know.
Available on Blu-ray & DVD Tuesday, December 27th
