I put the x in the spoiler, just to be on the safe side. Since I live in Sweden this part of Australian History is totally unknown to me, and the only other Australian gangster I've seen before was Chopper, and that was a movie I didn't like at all, though that one was very well acted. This movie "Dirty Deeds" I had never even heard of, and I found it in the bins that costs 2 for 99SKR (approx 9:90USD), and I chosed it mainly for the cover-photo of the DVD + four reliable names. Others have already told what this movie is about (the storyline) so I will not go into that. There is blood, very much blood indeed in this movie, but in this movie it's part of the story and loads of people being killed, but it's part of this movies storyline, so that didn't disturb me at all. After all they are very unpleasant people. I liked this movie very much, because it tells a story straight, but has many absurd and even farcical vignettes, and it moves along at a very pleasant speed. All the actors don't act, they ARE and BREATH the characters they play. Brian Brown (I don't know why, but he always reminds me of Michael Caine), Toni Collette (far from her About a Boy role), John Goodman (has he ever been bad, even in bad movies?) and Sam Neill (Absolutely perfect as the matter-of-fact but easy-to-bribe police) + the rest of the cast of for me unknowns.Can we today even imagine that there was a time when there wasn't at least one pizza-place within a few blocks? Apparently in Australia in 1969, and that part makes a very funny thread along in this movie. There is a very funny scene where they have found a restaurant in Sydney where they knew what a pizza is, but the slices are as thick as a birthday-cake.Another funny scene was when Bryan Brown, gets a hotel in the outbacks, and how quick the owner empties it when he sees how well he will be payed.All I can say is that I'm lucky I found this movie, just by chance.
... View MoreYes, it's awful. As to say not one redeeming feature. It was just an opportunity for a bunch of Aussies to have fun without having to do any acting (John Goodman or no) and the scriptwriter to not have to do any writing, and the photographer to not have to see anything, and they stick in Toni Collette as if that is going to help. Who are these people that give a movie like this a rating of 7? Are they people without any critical consciousness? It's just a combo of cowboy=car chases without the horses or the vehicles, just filming people reciting lines that somebody thinks have some sort of meaning to them when they in fact have nothing. Is there any set of standards that anyone adheres to?
... View MoreThis film was not a block buster by any means. However, it is a very clever film and the acting really pulls it together. Bryan Brown is respectable as the leading role and he is helped out greatly by his supporting cast, mainly John Goodman. Goodman's trademark has almost always been the soft big guy type, and he proves in this film that he has playing those type of characters down to a science. Sam Neill plays the crooked cop, a part that seemed to fit him, but his character is dry and does not receive much screen time. The film starts slow, but after it gets going, enough of a storyline comes forth to keep most interested. The climax and is not what I hoped for but the conclusion of the film will leave most feeling satisfied and it does a good job putting everything together.
... View MoreThis film was made solely for the purpose of promoting excrement (literally.) You get to see big buckets of human excrement carried from outhouses and splashed on car windshields. You get to see a large pool of pig excrement with actors rolling in it. I believe that you can even see some snake excrement as one of the heavies fires an M-16 on full auto at a poor snake slithering by in the background. (This last example requires you to slow down the DVD and proceed frame-by-frame. Luckily, the snake escapes the near-miss unharmed.)Other than that, you won't be missing much if you leave this on the rental store shelf. Bryan Brown is a good actor, but he adopts a completely different acting method and character in each scene. (It reminds me of the classic "Whose Line is It Anyway?" sketches where the comedians must act out a scene "in the manner of" some oddball set of circumstances. I can hear David Caesar now..."OK, Bryan, now act this scene as if you're Don Corleone and your car won't start. No! Now, act as if you're a hitman with two victims and only one bullet.")A pointless script and a competent movie, but not worth the price of a rental or the time to watch.
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