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Sigh...So much potential. So little delivery.
King of New York stars Christopher Walken as Frank White, a crime lord who has just been released from prison. Upon release, he works on taking over New York City's drug trade in order to rebuild a hospital in his old neighbourhood.
There are two reasons why I watched this - it was a gangster movie and it starred Christopher Walken. Neither element proved to be worth it.
First off, Walken. Like most people under the age of 25, I mainly know him for his comedic roles (like on Saturday Night Live or the Weapon of Choice video). At first I thought it would be interesting to see Walken in a leading role - I had hoped this would be something like a Scarface for Walken, perhaps a Carlito's Way. It didn't turn out that way. Compared to Al Pacino in the aforementioned examples, Walken has significantly less screen time in his own movie. This shouldn't be a problem because half of Walken's career has involved short screen time, but what time he does get is pretty much wasted. With the exception of one speech he gives near the end of this film, he doesn't deliver anything special and just seems to be playing a "murderous kingpin with a heart of gold" archetype without any real effort. If the central performance is lacklustre, then surely the rest of the movie can compensate...
Actually, it can't. There is nothing particularly special about this movie. It's about drugs in New York and how all the ethnically diverse gangs are warring over it. We've heard it all before. In that case, you've got to wonder what the movie can bring in to spice up this well-worn plot. Does it look good (insofar as these kind of movies can look "good")? Are the action sequences any good? Is the acting good?
In all three instances, no. The only thing that separates King of New York from all the other filmic portraits of New York as a fine city with a seedy underbelly is its usage of shades of blue. That's the only discernable difference it has to other movies of this ilk. Does the blue work? No. It makes several scenes unwatchable (in particular, one of the few action sequences where Frank is attacked by a group of gun-toting rivals - the saturation of blue makes it impossible to make out who's shooting who).
The VHS box I got this movie in stated that the movie was an "action thriller". What action? A couple of brief shootouts, one car chase (also affected by the overload of blue) - weak. Usually if a movie has a weak plot or characters, it can compensate with action. Not so with King of New York, where the action does not compensate for the plot. Or the acting, much of which is lamentable and clichéd (especially Laurence Fishburne as Jimmy, a walking stereotype of a black street thug). The only acting I thought was worth watching was David Caruso, only because it was amusing to see CSI's Horatio Caine be a foul-mouthed badass.
King of New York was nothing if not a disappointment. There was nothing to make this stand out in a good way. Acting that was mediocre at best, weak attempts at action and suspense, and above all an uninspired gangster plotline all came together to create this poorly executed movie. I'm out.
KING OF NEW YORK
(Abel Ferrara, 1990)
(Abel Ferrara, 1990)
Sigh...So much potential. So little delivery.
King of New York stars Christopher Walken as Frank White, a crime lord who has just been released from prison. Upon release, he works on taking over New York City's drug trade in order to rebuild a hospital in his old neighbourhood.
There are two reasons why I watched this - it was a gangster movie and it starred Christopher Walken. Neither element proved to be worth it.
First off, Walken. Like most people under the age of 25, I mainly know him for his comedic roles (like on Saturday Night Live or the Weapon of Choice video). At first I thought it would be interesting to see Walken in a leading role - I had hoped this would be something like a Scarface for Walken, perhaps a Carlito's Way. It didn't turn out that way. Compared to Al Pacino in the aforementioned examples, Walken has significantly less screen time in his own movie. This shouldn't be a problem because half of Walken's career has involved short screen time, but what time he does get is pretty much wasted. With the exception of one speech he gives near the end of this film, he doesn't deliver anything special and just seems to be playing a "murderous kingpin with a heart of gold" archetype without any real effort. If the central performance is lacklustre, then surely the rest of the movie can compensate...
Actually, it can't. There is nothing particularly special about this movie. It's about drugs in New York and how all the ethnically diverse gangs are warring over it. We've heard it all before. In that case, you've got to wonder what the movie can bring in to spice up this well-worn plot. Does it look good (insofar as these kind of movies can look "good")? Are the action sequences any good? Is the acting good?
In all three instances, no. The only thing that separates King of New York from all the other filmic portraits of New York as a fine city with a seedy underbelly is its usage of shades of blue. That's the only discernable difference it has to other movies of this ilk. Does the blue work? No. It makes several scenes unwatchable (in particular, one of the few action sequences where Frank is attacked by a group of gun-toting rivals - the saturation of blue makes it impossible to make out who's shooting who).
The VHS box I got this movie in stated that the movie was an "action thriller". What action? A couple of brief shootouts, one car chase (also affected by the overload of blue) - weak. Usually if a movie has a weak plot or characters, it can compensate with action. Not so with King of New York, where the action does not compensate for the plot. Or the acting, much of which is lamentable and clichéd (especially Laurence Fishburne as Jimmy, a walking stereotype of a black street thug). The only acting I thought was worth watching was David Caruso, only because it was amusing to see CSI's Horatio Caine be a foul-mouthed badass.
King of New York was nothing if not a disappointment. There was nothing to make this stand out in a good way. Acting that was mediocre at best, weak attempts at action and suspense, and above all an uninspired gangster plotline all came together to create this poorly executed movie. I'm out.