Running Scared (2006)reviewed by Benn "Where's the Humanity?" Farrell
In this extremely odd mobster fairy tale, low level mob thug Joey Gazelle, played by Paul Walker (Eight Below), has to dispose of a "hot" gun used in the killing of a dirty cop. Problems come up when Oleg, the Russian kid next door, played by Cameron Bright (Ultraviolet), steals the gun from Joey's hiding place and uses it in attempt to kill his abusive meth addicted father. Joey now has to locate runaway Oleg and the gun before either the dirty cops or his mobster colleagues kill him. Whether is it was sex, violence, ridiculously harsh language or some other form of perversion--like an adult couple who shoot videos of them molesting children and then carving them into pieces--this movie had something in every scene to raise an eyebrow at. This was the first "What the f**k was that" kind of movie of the year (2006). The film literally tried to turn this awkward mob movie into a fairy tale. Like shadows of dark lurking beasts in opaque windows, when there are none; just their shadows. If you don't get the fairy tale comparison, just watch the end credits and tell me what YOU make out of it. The movie was so odd, I honestly don't know if I should recommend people seeing it, cause I didn't like it, OR I should tell people to see it cause it's odd and different. "Running Scared" also had such unnecessary violence it actually bothered me. In the opening scene, I almost felt like they were sensationalizing the violence so much so that I wouldn't recognize the fact it doesn't have any decent material. Vera Farmiga (15 Minutes) played Gazelle's hot wife and she gets her crotch pleasured in the laundry room during their first scene together. She's sure hot and has an interesting face, but their relationship was as odd as the rest of the picture. The "lust" scene between them skirted an NC-17 rating. The other thing I don't like about this movie is it shows the world as not having a single decent person among it. Everyone is a bad person for some reason. No one wants to do anything of value or better himself or herself, so the setting was a little tough to believe. I think it falls into writer/director Wayne Kramer's (Crossing Over, The Cooler) fairytale concept. Overall, "Running Scared" sucked, but it was interesting. Benn - Where's the Humanity?
Usually, when a movie is THIS awkward and weird, I don't get into it. Not that I really enjoyed this one, but it was interesting to some degree.