Running Scared Review

Anyone who has read this blog has seen the recent article about Running Scared and it’s official site hosting an oral sex flash game. Sadly, there is little oral sex in this movie. The movie, however, was strangely…entertaining. T-Unit saw this flick the night before I did and reported that he thought the movie was wildly entertaining. I decided to check out the flick.

What I found was an entirely entertaining, gritty, spitting, balls-to-the-wall action fest with a twisted story. The opening sequence alone throws you right into the action, with a drug deal gone bad and dead cops. Paul Walker plays Joe, a low level mobster, working in a small crew. He is given this shiny gun to hide as it is the murder weapon for the botched drug deal. Joe takes it, it get’s taken, all hell breaks loose. The film does a nice job bashing characters into each other and sets a dirty feel throughout the beginning parts of the movie. Walker’s preformance isn’t the stuff of dreams as a mobster, but he plays a pissed off hood pretty decently. His wife plays a pretty good ingenue trying to hold it together, but something tells me the writing was a little wooden for all of the actors. The two boys, to some level are decent enough. The secondary characters were perhaps the most intriguing. The Russian Meth Dealer, or Olli’s father, was particularly off-kilt as a good hearted man who got caught up in drugs and love’s John Wayne. My favorite two characters were the “wholesome couple” with two kids in the back of their conversion van and a nice “play-room”. They were just sadistically vacant of emotion and creepy. The hockey scene was also sick, with a True Romance like blow-out at the end.

With some of the nicer things said, this movie did not have a great script, as the F-Bomb is used at least 300 times a dialogue. The use of the F-Bomb is not artful here, as it is in other mob movies such as Goodfellas and Casino. When Joe Pesci drops the bomb, it’s nasaled in a thick New Jersey that just meshes with the scene. When everyone is dropping it in Running Scared, it feels forced and like the writer ran out of ideas. I love “fuck”, and for me to say it was over-used…means it is really over-used. The character Olli, played by the creepy kid from Godsend , is also really an annoying point for me in the movie. I understand the kid isn’t supposed to smile and be somewhat reclusive yet strong, but this kid just plays him empty. He is creepy and lifeless and I found myself getting really annoyed with his bullshit. Maybe that is good writing, because that little shit would have found my belt across his ass if he pulled that crap with me. The flick could have been shorter with lesser story lines but they all are pretty effective, although some are better than others.

Running Scared is a stylized action flick with some cool points, foundationed with decent acting and cool direction. If you’re into a movie that is riddled with swears, guns, blood, fighting, blood, swears, some sex, swears and blood then you will enjoy the movie. If you could do without the heavy-ness, well your probably a pussy anyways. This movie is cool, and as JoBlo pointed out, almost like Grand Theft Auto brought to screen. Check this out, if you want action. I give this a 7 Bones out of 10 Bones, for bloody, sexy, vulgar fun.