Stars: Brad Pitt, Ray Liotta, Richard Jenkins, James Gandolfini,
Scoot McNairy
A trio of young toughs knock off a high-stakes card game run by the mob. Big mistake. Then instead of slinking off with the loot, they catch a case of uncontrollable verbal diarrhea, landing them in the scope of the mob’s enforcer. Said enforcer, Jackie Cogan (Brad Pitt), doesn’t employ bone-crunching, disfigurement or dismemberment in exacting revenge. He prefers to dispatch marks to the Great Beyond, softly “from a distance.” After convincing the boss that taking care of the robbers is a two-man job, he enlists the services of out-of-town muscle, Mickey (James Gandolfini), a bear of a guy with a face that’s on a first-name basis with mayhem. Pitt and Gandolfini make a good team in this thriller that is just a tad stereotypical in its portrayal of organized crime and criminals, but that doesn’t detract one iota from the fun. –p.d. lee
