![]() The banal but often hilarious humor and material endears these characters to us and succeeds in fleshing them out. Gangster Squad is a tense thrill ride but Fleischer allows these slower scenes with the Squad itself to break the tension. It’s an eclectic bunch and moreover actors you’d never expect to stand opposite one another but really it works so well. Like any group effort they first need to be brought on board and while an “assembling the team” montage or sequence is always fun, it’s the scenes once they’re assembled that become the most enjoyable. From the nasally Ryan Gosling, to the old gun hand Robert Patrick (man it’s good to see him get a sizable role again), the Tonto to his Lone Ranger Michael Pena, to the radio intel expert Giovanni Ribisi (and his dapper Walt Disney mustache), and the streetwise eagle-eyed Anthony Mackie everyone hits their marks and makes the most of their screen time. The cast is utterly terrific and though their uniqueness seems to find them plucked right out of a comic book or pulpy noir, novel they all work. Also it helped that they weren’t afraid of him. Yet that’s one distinction the film (well the story really) makes the members of this secret unit had to be the kinds of individuals who were unaffected by Cohen’s money. Cohen owned police officers, judges, etc. It’s wording and phrasing like that which happens every so often in Fleisher’s film that gives you an idea of what it was like back then. was, as Nolte’s Chief Parker put it, not a crime wave but enemy occupation. He earned the respect of the mob a long time ago and his control of L.A. People were afraid of this diminutive mobster and they should be, he had no qualms about making his point or getting what he wanted. He used violence to send his message and it was loud and clear. Where they’re prepared to go, no ordinary lawman may enter and who would want to? Penn’s Mickey Cohen is as ruthless as they come. Yet in order to be effective they must operate off the books turn in their badges. John O’Mara to oversee and lead the task force. In an attempt to fight fire with fire he brings on the tough as nails Sgt. #Gangland movie sean penn skinThe bullets fly fast and free, everyone hits like they have brass knuckles under their skin and when the film starts to look too pretty or gets caught up in sentimentality violence rears it’s ugly head and reminds us of just how dangerous this job was.Ĭrime, corruption and fear ran rampant in California so much so that it caused police chief Parker ( Nick Nolte) to organize a clandestine unit to take on Cohen. Gangster Squad is violent with a capital V and one hard-edged affair. John O’Mara ( Josh Brolin) and his talent for following his hunches even if it most of the times means he doesn’t do things by the books. Like a whirlwind we are swept up in a kidnapping in progress that shows us Sgt. #Gangland movie sean penn movieRuben Fleischer ( Zombieland) wastes no time immersing us in what kind of movie this will be. In the film, just as it happened in real life, this elite group of officers were assembled for their uniqueness and proved to be the one and only method of freeing up the choke-hold Cohen had on L.A. Based on a book by Paul Lieberman, Gangster Squad tells the true story of the secretive police unit that took down real life mobster Mickey Cohen ( Sean Penn). ![]()
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