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Brooklyn Rules (2007)

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Synopsis

Brooklyn Rules is a powerful story of loyalty, friendship, and sacrifice all set against the backdrop of the inner workings of the mafia. Taking place in and around Brooklyn circa 1985, at a time when John Gotti was working his way to the top of the mob, the film follows the story of three lifelong friends whose different ambitions threaten to shake their enduring bond.

Movie review

From Time Out New York

It’d be easy to write off this misty-eyed mélange of midlife nostalgia and movie-movie show-offery as bush-league Scorsese, but the aggressively derivative Brooklyn Rules is a fascinating artifact of how absorbed into the mainstream Marty’s idiom has become. No wonder his last few flicks have been disappointments: He didn’t stray from the path; three generations of film-school punks ran him off it.

Punks, albeit the cuddly variety, are what Brooklyn Rules predictably revolves around. Three Bay Ridge mooks circa 1985 wrestle with stock Hollywood dilemmas: Straight arrow Michael (frog-faced Prinze) is torn between the ’hood and a Columbia poli-sci hottie (Suvari); knuckle-dragging Carmine (Caan) flirts with a job as muscle for a local mob boss (Baldwin—is there no film this guy won’t do?); and cinephiliac Bobby (Entourage’s Ferrara) cracks wise as the chubby, lovable and inevitably doomed sidekick.

Screenwriter and Sopranos alum Terence Winter tosses as many genres into this autobiographical mix as possible, from college romance to revenge thriller and male weepie, but links them with nothing more substantial than canned sentimentality. So despite the HBO-worthy prodigiousness of fuck in its dialogue, Brooklyn Rules comes off as what Mean Streets might’ve been with Disney funding.

Author: Mark Holcomb

Time Out New York Issue 607: May 17–23, 2007

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