Brandon at Random Reviews

*no spoilers*

Some 15+ years ago now, I was working at my local Grand Ledge Pizza Hut, and I was getting some sage movie advice from one of the delivery drivers there. He said “You should check out Boondock Saints, and Green Street Hooligans”, so I went to the now defunct Family Video and rented them both and watched em. Not much of a story in retrospect, but I’m not gonna backspace all of that and type something else because it’s a true story. Maybe you didn’t know I worked at Pizza Hut in my youth. Maybe you expected a waitress to give the movie advice, who knows?

You know who plays a hell of an eccentric-type? Willem Dafoe. He’s doing weird shit all over the place here and it’s well executed by him indeed. He really nails this part in my opinion, easily one of his best performances. Also, fun fact: while shooting nude scenes in the movie Antichrist, Dafoe had to have a stand-in because the director felt that his penis was “confusingly large”, at least that’s how the story goes. Dafoe’s character Smecker is investigating the “crimes” of characters Connor and Murphy MacManus fraternal twins who are working in the name of God in their eyes with the murders they are committing, portrayed by Sean Patrick Flanery and Norman Reedus respectively.

I’ve gotta admit, this movie is still very cool on the rewatch. I won’t give a bunch away for those who haven’t seen it, but just the way they present the crimes and the investigation is…well darn it, I think it’s downright nifty. They don’t hold back on the graphic detail of the major moments. The cinematography is all pretty great, even considering it also maintains a lower budget look and feel than most major releases, which makes sense since it had a super limited release for a myriad of reasons including the anti-gun violence climate of the Columbine shooting.

So, I would say definitely check this one out. It’s free with Amazon Prime Video right now so if you’ve got it give this a chance. I would say it’s almost Tarantino-esque in many ways, but also very different in many others. There’s a lot of R-rated gory violence here, so wait until your kids are like 6, maybe 7 years-old tops like my mom and dad did before you let them watch something like this with you. God The Terminator was sweet as an extreme youth. I remember seeing Robocop, especially the scene where he shoots the guy in the dick who was sexually assaulting a woman and I was like 9 and man it was fucking sweet, no regrets.

Watch The Boondock Saints for a great all around experience, not just because that guy I worked with at Pizza Hut, circa 2006 said so, but because I did. My only criticism might be some very indy film-ish level bad acting from some of the bit parts and a few mediocre directing choices made but not really much to complain about. Also, I get the feeling this is a total guy movie so be aware of that going in.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️1/2