This movie got some of the most deranged reviews I ever read on IMDb. Most people read the non-fiction book or watched a documentary about the real "Iceman" and complained about everything in the movie - from not being true to the "real" story to missing gory details. Maybe they are not aware that a movie and a documentary are two different things…..Others complained about Kuklinski and the mob not being glorified enough, as in other "cool" gangsters' movies. I watched it as a self-standing movie, without any comparison to books or documentaries. As such, it gives a rather chilling but probably correct insight into the non- glamorous, sleazy world of real-life mafia.Kuklinski was a hit-man who managed to lead a double life for decades. Allegedly his wife and children never knew how he earned his life. Kuklinski was a brutal killing machine, associated with the mafia but also "freelancing". A true psychopath who killed over 100 people Kuklinski could inflict pain without any distress and his only motivation was money. Shannon plays the part chillingly well. Ryder was also good as the hypocrite wife, who knows something is going on, but find it more convenient to ignore it. Chris Evans was for me the star of the movie, playing with some vitality another psycho serial killer, without making him even slightly sympathetic.The main problem with the movie was that Kuklinski besides being a psychopath, seems to suffer from split personality. He is brutally cold and emotionless, but also a devoted husband and father. I did not buy that. This was gloomy and depressing, although reasonably well made. I regret having wasted time watching it.

This wasn't a bad movie, but once I read about the life of the real Kuklinski, I felt this film was pretty much a whitewash of the man. Vronen presents Kuklinski as brutal to punks and wise guys, but essentially loving toward his wife and family (if a bit distant). In truth, K. regularly savagely beat his wife and once tried to run her over with a car. He also didn't kill just punks in pool halls and scumbag wise guys, he killed random people on the street--sometimes just to test out a method of murder that he was planning to use for a contract hire to make sure it was truly lethal. K. was savagely beaten and tortured by a father who succeeded in killing one of his older children, though never charged, during one such beating. It seems he was killing Daddy over and over again in all those murders. This is largely unexplored by Vronen's oddly two-dimensional portrait--in spite of its unjustified sympathy for the man. But now for the headline. James Franco is listed as one of the headliners in this flick, but he has only a very small part in the film. Nonetheless, he could--and should-- have given the film a very powerful moment. The scene is apparently true and K., who murdered hundreds without compunction, later felt guilty for its depth of psychological sadism. In it, Franco's character--a two bit hood, gangster hanger on--is pleading for his life, praying for it, actually, and K. tells him he will wait, delay his death, so he can see if his prayers will be answered. Franco's character, Marty, prays with a combination of desperation and hopelessness as he is confronted with his own lack of belief in an intervening God, even as he prays to stave off death for as long as he can. Shannon's K. waits impassively for time to pass, for God to fail to show up, so that he can finish the task at hand. Shannon is great in the scene--his combination of patience, cruelty, and implacable power--an embodiment, like Javier Bardem's killer in No Country for Old Men, of doom. But Franco is absolutely horrible in this scene since you don't believe for one second this guy thinks he's about to die. He phones the performance in as if it were his Oscar hosting gig. The camera is on him in a scene that should make you feel intense angst, but absolutely nothing is happening. It's not subtle, it's not intense. It's Franco sprawled out on a couch with his hands folded in prayer and squeezing his eyes tight like he was afraid someone was going to use a squirt gun on them. If you threw a rolled up newspaper at a casting line you'd hit somebody who could have done the scene better. Franco is a wildly inconsistent actor, who can be quite good, but is often awful simply because he's still acting like a spoiled adolescent even though he's now in his mid 30s. Get your act together, man; be professional. If I were Shannon, who delivers a great performance, watching Franco screw the pooch in this scene, I'd be feeling murderous too.

I found this film good-paced and grabbing. It is Michael Shannon's performance that glues all the scenes together solidly, especially for some scenes not so self-solidifying. The main problem here is the script. It seems like the writer has problems extracting and summarizing. The story is with a good outer frame, and yet strangely hollow on the inside. It must be at the pick-and-choose process. Another probable reason is that the basis of this film came from two different books. The evidence of doubling, and even intersecting, information is quite apparent. Conflicting personalities and emotions can help build up a film's tone. But screenwriters can't be conflictual themselves, or the entire film feels like a swinging pendulum. I think "The Iceman" is a good enough film. Certainly entertaining. But it could have been a lot better, possibly along the line of "Goodfellas" and even "The Godfather". If we can walk back, there are certain points that the filmmakers should have exploited. The contrasting life of a businessman and a ruthless contract killer is what should have been dug deeper and expressed profusely. Some extra scenes should have been added to show us the man's great, great anguish. The Winona Rider's character is incredibly underused. As someone so close, it is she who can observe or even spot the contradictions. Whatever she feels about her husband, or the resolution she may have had over the years, it should have shown much more dramatic at the arrest scene. Surprises and anger are not enough. There must be some elements of life shattering or a state of deep shock. All in all, it comes back to the script, as acting and directing are indeed satisfactory.

The story nicely balances between the depictions of the ruthlessness of the contract killer Richie and the loving husband and father of two Richie. The two sides of the characters are nicely given equal portions of screen time and detail depth. Those depictions get even better with adequate support from experienced actors and actresses acting on them. I like to see the fact that only Michael Shannon's Richie, as the central character is actually the one character who links Chris Evans' character Frezzy and Winona Ryder's Deborah, while Chris and Winona don't even get to do a scene together. On the acting side I think Michael Shannon's performance here is one of his best. He did enough in surfacing all the characters emotions while keeping the character's calm and cool as a killer. I am quite amazed at how Chris Evans swerves his schedules in and out of movie shoots, from The Avengers, to Snowpiercer, and to this movie, all with significant roles.