It is against my method of reviewing to compare one movie to another and I won't do so here either, but I want to mention that Jean Reno played a great role in the movie Leon as an social inept assassin who gets saddled with a teen girl. There is however nothing remarkable about 22 Bullets or The immortal(L'Immortal) as it is called in France. Reno plays Mattei a retired gangster who gets gunned down in an underground garage by an unknown group of men for unknown reasons. Instead of dying he survives the 22 bullets that hit him and it is obvious that he is going for some payback time. The hit men send one of their own to the hospital to finish the work they started, but he kills the wrong person. The next one and half hour we follow Mattei down a beaten path figuring out who the hit men are, why they tried to kill him and killing them one after the other. This trail of dead bodies would have given setups for some special deaths, like having the guy with the dogs killed by his dogs, or killed with an overdoses of cocaine, for Mattei catches him in a drugs lab, but nothing of the kind is ever used. It is pretty boring run-of-the-mill what you get to see.The movie keeps forgetting important stuff. For instance Mattei is numb in his right hand but yet he can steer a motorcycle several times in the movie during chases. How the heck is Mattei going to control the throttle with his numb right hand?At yet another time we witness how the female cop is being spied upon in her car so the hit men can find out where Mattei's family is, but a few scenes later we see Mattei planning with the same cop in the same car and apparently the hit men are now not listening in. All kinds of silliness abounds. At one moment Mattei has to liberate his young son from the bad guys. So he jumps on the windscreen of the car, then proceeds to pound the guy against the car slamming him repeatedly, while he knows his son is locked up in the boot and must have been terrified to death. At another moment Mattei is fighting with someone in a kitchen. He gets overpowered, and just right at that time the cops bust in to save him.The police is, of course, hugely inept so Mattei can get away with killing his enemies unopposed. At one moment the police botches a tailing job when they try to find out where he goes by chasing him around town with cars. With such an inept law enforcement agency Mattei can even get away with gunning people down in broad daylight in the streets. One watches this movie, is baffled by the silliness and looks for any redeeming qualities. Well, some attempts a depth are made, but really there isn't much here that warrants any further attention. A b-movie at best.

Well, i tried: i watched it for one hour. But even if it was good to meet again with the Berrys (father & daughter), i couldn't endure more this crap: Still, it has everything to be interesting: Marseilles is indeed a city know for its gangsters, its executions. Berry father has an eye for the camera. It's a true story. But, the pace of the movie is too slow, as flat as a dead man heartbeat. The story, full of useless characters, is very hard to follow and the flashbacks not really informative. The cinematography is just awful as it's yellow anytime, everywhere. The Godfather is felt in each frame but here, the stakes, the production are just cheap and there's really nothing "prestigious" about those kingpins. The biggest difficulty is the cast: everyone makes a face, everyone feels unhappy, so it makes me unhappy. In fact, the first hour is the silent confrontation between a hypochondriac boss and another convalescent that lies in a bed. After, it's the usual revenge by the guns against bad, bad gangsters by a philosophic killer! It's not a surprise that it was awarded the Gerard of the Worst movie of the year and probably of the decade!

Jean Renos character would probably not even smile at 50 Cents near-death experience. That wouldn't even be considered a scratch in his book. But apart from this (useless?) trivia, there is so much that you can find in this movie. Jean Renos characterization for once. The story and the other characters too.Of course you could say that this is romanticising an evil person a bit. But then again, this is a movie. You cannot try and apply rules of real life to it. Other movies with criminals involved might have been worse in that regard. And after all, there are experiences in life, that are truly life-changing. And if what Renos character has gone through does not count, what else does? It's not all drama though, there is a good portion of action to be found here. And very well shot (no pun) and acted out. The end could not have been any other. At least not for me. Highly recommended

I have to say I'm not a fan of Besson's productions, but this one is a good surprise. If you're looking for a very clever plot, forget it. But if you want to enjoy beautiful views of the glorious city of Marseille and have a thrill at the gangster's atmosphere it used to live in, this is the one. Jean Reno is solid like usual, Kad Merad -such a good actor- doesn't find his comfort zone in the bad guy, Marina Fois is brilliant, what on earth is Richard Berry doing in his own movie where his role has no impact? Overall a good moment, not Borsalino or French connection, but i definitely recommend it. If you want to see more of this mysterious city, try to locate the following titles: Comme un aimant, Taxi, Un ange, FC 1 and 2, Borsalino 1 and 2, movies with Raimu...