MEN WITH GUNS (1998) *
Donal Logue and his buddy go to collect some money at a farm and wind up getting beat up, pissed on, and humiliated. They buy some guns and head back to the farmhouse looking for payback. Of course, things go south and they are forced to gun down all the scumbags living in the establishment. Donal finds a bunch of coke in the house and he decides to sell it to make some quick cash. What he doesn’t know is that the coke belongs to mobster Paul Sorvino, who soon sends his goons out looking for his missing drugs.
Men with Guns is a thriller set in the Tarantino mold. Characters have long-winded monologues, do drugs, and get into Mexican standoffs. In fact, the whole plot more or less seems like a retread of True Romance, minus the romance (not to mention great acting and stellar dialogue).
I should’ve known this flick was going to suck when I saw that it was directed by Kari Skogland. She was also responsible for the equally inane Children of the Corn 666 and Liberty Stands Still. She uses a lot of annoying filters on the camera and relies heavily on useless slow motion. The most irritating thing about the flick though is the way the dialogue is constantly repeated in some scenes (especially during the scene where they buy the guns).
But what it all boils down to is this: Men with Guns features a bunch of annoying characters doing and saying a bunch of annoying things. I mean these guys weren’t exactly likeable to begin with, but once they steal the coke and start acting like big shots they become even more intolerable. And because we never give one single solitary shit about any of these bozos, the movie is more or less a chore to sit though.