Smokin' Aces is an interesting film, despite itself and its (maybe) cliche plot. Picture this; card sharp and magician turned Mafia snitch Johnny "Aces" Israel (played hilariously by Jeremy Piven) is under federal protection from two FBI agents Messner and Carruthers (Ryan Reynolds, Ray Liotta) who themselves are under the direction of the FBI director Stanley Locke (Andy Garcia). The aforementioned Mafia snitch is obviously in some deep water, being that he wants to rat out the La Cosa Nostra, so naturally he has a few people after him. Actually, ten. This includes a bail bondsman played by Ben Affleck, a master of disguise played by the Irish Tommy Flanagan, an ebonics-blurting hitwoman in Alicia Keys, and a trio of redneck neo nazis called the Tremor brothers... and much more!You might think a movie with so many characters being thrown at ol' Buddy Aces could get complicated, and it certainly does. The dialogue is pretty much non-stop from the time the movie begins, think a Tarantino flick on steroids without some of the wit. It's fast-talking, fast-moving, and the movie really ends up shooting itself in the foot in that respect. It tries to do pretty much everything, introduce over a dozen characters (most of which played by big names, this movie would make Ocean's Eleven blush with its cast) and try to flesh them out completely, while still keeping the plot under wraps and making it less than 2 hours long. I must say, it can be overwhelming, but they pull it off well enough. Think of a barrel of snakes, and that's somewhere close to where Smokin' Aces is, plot-wise.
I know this movie hasn't been recieved very well by most of the press, but it's really worth a shot if you're looking for some good ol' fashioned Vegas shoot-em-up popcorn action-type movies, with bizarre fast-talking gangsters and hitmen by the dozen.
7/10
