Harvey Keitel is looking all of his 82 years and more but one thing is for sure , his acting hasn't diminished one little bit , which is a good thing for this film because if it wasn't for him , this would have been dull as dish water .
When the aging Meyer Lansky is investigated by the Feds, who suspect he has stashed away millions of dollars over half a century, the retired gangster reveals the untold truth about his life as the boss of the National Crime Syndicate.
I love a gangster film but they have to have something a little different about them for me to really enjoy them . This does and doesn't.
The scenes with Keitel and to a certain extent Sam Worthington are really watchable ( even though there are too many words of wisdom ) but the problem is , because Lansky is telling his life story to David Stone , the film is interspersed with flashback scenes of when he was a young man and to be brutally honest they aren't any good . The Director makes the mistake of doing the gangster scenes like painting by numbers . Every cliche in book is used and it's just dull .
Thankfully Harvey Keitel turns a sows ear into a silk purse and makes the film enjoyable although I couldn't stop looking at the prosthetic nose they gave him which was very distracting.
To confuse people for some weird reason the the movie company changed the name from lansky to A Righteous man - a much duller title . Why do they do things like that ?
When the aging Meyer Lansky is investigated by the Feds, who suspect he has stashed away millions of dollars over half a century, the retired gangster reveals the untold truth about his life as the boss of the National Crime Syndicate.
I love a gangster film but they have to have something a little different about them for me to really enjoy them . This does and doesn't.
The scenes with Keitel and to a certain extent Sam Worthington are really watchable ( even though there are too many words of wisdom ) but the problem is , because Lansky is telling his life story to David Stone , the film is interspersed with flashback scenes of when he was a young man and to be brutally honest they aren't any good . The Director makes the mistake of doing the gangster scenes like painting by numbers . Every cliche in book is used and it's just dull .
Thankfully Harvey Keitel turns a sows ear into a silk purse and makes the film enjoyable although I couldn't stop looking at the prosthetic nose they gave him which was very distracting.
To confuse people for some weird reason the the movie company changed the name from lansky to A Righteous man - a much duller title . Why do they do things like that ?