This gang warfare drama is from director Scott Kalvert, whose previous film was the controversial and violent The Basketball Diaries (1995). In the sweltering summer of 1958, Leon (Stephen Dorff) and Bobby (Brad Renfro) are leaders of the Brooklyn street gang known as the Deuces. When their brother Alley Boy died from an overdose, the two toughs vowed to keep narcotics out of their turf, but now they're being muscled by a new and more powerful gang called the Vipers, fueled by drug money and led
by mobster Fritzy Zennetti (Matt Dillon). As a vicious gang war heats up that will determine Brooklyn's future, a romance develops between Bobby and Annie (Fairuza Balk), the leader of a girl gang. Deuces Wild co-stars Frankie Muniz, Balthazar Getty, Max Perlich, Drea de Matteo, Deborah Harry, Vincent Pastore, Joshua Leonard, James Franco, and Johnny Knoxville. ~ Karl Williams, Rovi
This is a movie that can't say no to a melodramatic opportunity, and whatever verisimilitude inspired Paul Kimatian and Christopher Gambale to write a script based on Kimatian's memories of the gangs has been utterly lost along the way.
The script from first-timers Paul Kimatian and Christopher Gambale requires Dillon to say corny things like: 'Bricks don't fall outta the sky in this neighborhood unless I'm throwin' 'em.' Tony Soprano, he ain't.
If it was the intention of Kalvert, Gambale and Kimatian to infiltrate their script with every stereotypical hoodlum cliché from every movie covering Brooklyn bad boys, they were on the money. Too bad their movie isn't.
Tentando desesperadamente se transformar em uma espécie de O Selvagem da Motocicleta do novo milênio (com toques de Amor, Sublime Amor), o filme é esquemático demais, tornando-se artificial e nada envolvente.
I accuse films of being generic and unoriginal on a regular basis, but rarely have I seen a movie so determined to check off every cliché on the list as Deuces Wild.
Astonishing isn't the word -- neither is incompetent, incoherent or just plain crap. Indeed, none of these words really gets at the very special type of badness that is Deuces Wild.
It does nothing new with the old story, except to show fisticuffs in this sort of stop-go slow motion that makes the gang rumbles look like they're being streamed over a 28K modem.
If they broke out into elaborate choreography, singing and finger snapping it might have held my attention, but as it stands I kept looking for the last exit from Brooklyn.
You'll have a ball with Deuces Wild. Not because it's a well-made and intelligent movie, but because it plays like the world's most straight-faced spoof.
While this movie is completely ridiculous and corny, it's still fun to see Stephen Dorff being the bizarre person he is. There's actually some really good things about the movie, there's some very decent acting from Brad Renfro and Balthazar Getty, but the majority is just a rip-off of various other gangster movies.
There's really nothing that hasn't been seen before and the characters aren't interesting enough to make it memorable. Visually it's pretty bland too.
Not bad, too cliche at times and predictable resolution, but still not bad. I guess it helps that i'm a sucker for 50s retro stuff. Fairuza Balk also looks hot in some kind of weird way.
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