State of Grace | Sean Penn, Ed Harris | 'State of Grace' picks up where 'The Godfather' left off...

State of Grace | Sean Penn, Ed Harris | Great movie

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State of Grace

	State of Grace Sean Penn, Ed Harris Orion Home Video, 1992 average customer review:based on 66 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

Overshadowed by GoodFellas when it was released in 1990, State of Grace gradually emerged as one of the best New York gangster films of its decade. It was also the first to feature the Irish American mob known as the Westies. Here, their territory west of Times Square is being gentrified by an unwelcome infusion of yuppie cash, squeezing them into a reluctant alliance with Mafia kingpins. Frankie (Ed Harris) is the boss; little brother Jackie (Gary Oldman) is his volatile muscle; their friend Terry (Sean Penn) has returned from an extended absence, harboring a dangerous secret while rekindling his love for Frankie and Jackie's sister Kathleen (Robin Wright, Penn's future wife). Giving one of his scariest, most violent performances, Oldman offers stark, brutal contrast to Harris's pent-up fury, while Penn breathes life into his character's standard-issue dilemma. A former protégé of Steven Spielberg's, director Phil Joanou handles this gritty potboiler with confident, unobtrusive style, ramping up the tension of divided loyalties, even as the plot grows increasingly familiar. --Jeff Shannon

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'State of Grace' picks up where 'The Godfather' left off...

If "The Godfather had one flaw, it was the odd stoicism that permeated some of the scenes, the slow moments in between major events. "State of Grace" fixes those few things that may have made "The Godfather" a slightly imperfect film, and delivers a phenomenal gangster film with passion and honesty that are frighteningly real.

The entire cast is brilliant, aided by a magnificent script and artistic editing and framing. Gary Oldman stands out above the rest, transforming his character from volatile to charming to sympathetic with talent and an ugly honesty that makes for a captivating performance (or is he performing at all? is he just *being*? I can't find the seams in Oldman's work that separate him from the characters he portrays). I couldn't see a bad actor in the bunch, though, and Robin Wright is absolutely magnificent as the conflicted Kathleen, the sister of Jackie (Oldman) and Freddie (Ed Harris).

This is an absolutely wonderful film; it's well worth your time.

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Great movie

This is a great mob/gangster movie with a great cast. Surprisingly, it has been largely overlooked. In fact, I had never even heard of it until I saw it on IFC in 2008, 18 years after it was released!

This movie also has a lot of similarities with The Departed. I am surprised few have noted the similarities:

*The Irish Mob.
*The demented Irish Mob "Godfather," played by Ed Harris.
*The undercover cop who was affiliated with the gang, left, became an officer, went undercover, and then returned.
*The love interest with a person close to the undercover officer's friend.

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A Mobster's Homecoming

At the outset, I will concede that I've never been really big on mob movies. They're OK I guess, but they've never been at the top of my list of favorite genres. That said, this is one of my favorite mob movies of the limited number of mob films I've seen in my life.

Sean Penn portrays a Boston police officer [Terry] who is called back to his hometown of New York City to assist with an NYPD Special Investigations Unit. More specifically, he is asked to go undercover in the Irish quadrant of the city, known as the Hell's Kitchen.

He is given the task of spying on his old friends of the Flannery clan. Ed Harris plays Frankie Flannery, the head of an Irish mob outfit in the Kitchen. Gary Oldman plays Jackie Flannery, Frankie's impulsive, violence-prone loose cannon of a brother.

Robin Wright Penn portrays Kate, the sister of the Flannery brothers. She is most well known for being Sean Penn's wife (although I'm unsure whether they were married yet when this film was made) and for starring in The Princess Bride (Special Edition). Kate has always done her best to escape the life of being the sister to criminals, but feels that with Terry's return she is being sucked back into the affairs of the Kitchen.

All through the storyline, there are hints that the Irish mob used to be far more powerful & autonomous than it is these days. Also, the Hell's Kitchen was much more "pure" Irish, but over time the percentage of Irishmen in the Kitchen has declined, and the Irish mob's power has eroded along with this decline. So much as changed, in fact, that Flannery's outfit these days is the mob world's equivalent of a "subcontractor" to an Italian mob outfit. This, of course, sparks all sorts of resentment and minor turf battles that have the propensity of churning out tragic outcomes.

As a sidenote, in this story Ed Harris & Gary Oldman play brothers. They would both go on to individually portray the great composer Ludwig van Beethoven. Oldman plays the musician in Immortal Beloved while Harris plays Beethoven in the recent Copying Beethoven. That both actors can play in a mob movie and turn around & play the same historical figure (very well on both accounts, I may add!) is a testimony to the acting prowess of both.

The present film is directed by Philip Jounou, who also directed U2's film U2 - Rattle and Hum. John Turtorro frequently shows up in mob movies, and in this one he is a cop instead of a mobster. One can't question the competency of the cast overall as it is top-notch. If you like mob movies at all, or if you have a single drop of Irish blood in your veins, then I would highly recommend this film. If neither of the above applies to you, I still this film would be worth a viewing.

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Gary Oldman as Jackie Flannery!

I'm not going to give a synopsis of the movie, but I will talk about how classic Gary Oldman is in this movie as the character of Jackie Flannery, the firecracker, semi-insane younger brother of the head of the Irish Mob in Hell's Kitchen New York. He just has so much personality that you HAVE to love him! (Not to mention, ladies, he is nice to look at). If you have seen Gary in "The Professional", I could almost say that Jackie Flannery and Norman Stansfield could be cousins or related in some way (even though they are different types of crazy).

Sean Penn is the main main character in this and he is always good in everything he's in. But as far as mob movies go, it's not the best. See it for Gary Oldman's performance!

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