Military Movies - Military Times

Smokin’ hot

Crime-caper flicks with big rosters of all-star (or at least recognizable) talent were a staple of the 1960s but were a dying breed by the early ’90s.

Then Quentin Tarantino put them back in fashion by unleashing his absurdly stylized vision on an unsuspecting public with the classics “Reservoir Dogs” (1992) and “Pulp Fiction” (1994).

In the years since, the list of directors seeking to top Tarantino with increasingly jittery, adrenaline-soaked, blood-spattered underworld mayhem is long and mostly undistinguished.

Writer-director Joe Carnahan takes his shot and scores fairly well with “Smokin’ Aces,” a wild (if paper-thin) grunge-fest that takes some time to get rolling but delivers a fine rush once it does.

Buddy “Aces” Israel (Jeremy Piven), a “five-time Las Vegas entertainer of the year” with close links to the Mob, has sparked a civil war within the Nevada wing of La Cosa Nostra and is looking to save himself by turning state’s evidence against big boss Primo Sparazza (Joseph Ruskin).

Just before vanishing under the feds’ wings for good, Buddy jumps bail and heads to Lake Tahoe for one last weekend of unrestrained debauchery. Sparazza hears about this and offers $1 million to any hitter who kills Buddy and delivers his heart.

The race is on between a trio federal agents — Ryan Reynolds, Ray Liotta and Andy Garcia — who want their pigeon back, and the quirky array of assassins drawn to Tahoe like moths to flame, hoping to score that fat payday.

They include a pair of slinky sistahs (Alicia Keys and Davenia McFadden), a trio of neo-Nazi wildmen (Chris Pine, Kevin Durand and Maury Sterling), a vicious master of disguise (Tommy Flanagan), and a torture expert who once chewed his fingers to the bone to prevent Interpol from printing him (Nestor Carbonell). Also in the mix are Ben Affleck, Peter Berg and Martin Henderson as bail bondsmen on Buddy’s trail.

Once everyone is in place, the film becomes a nonstop blur of carnage as the ordnance flies thick and heavy at every turn.

There’s zero room for character development; even Piven, who has honed a screen persona that is equal parts charismatic and annoying, gets no time to do anything more than deliver a few truncated rants and stare at his coked-out visage in the mirror several times.

Still, clever bits are sprinkled throughout. One highlight is an early scene in which the neo-Nazis have gunned down Affleck. One of them kneels down and provides both voices in a surreal imaginary conversation with the body, manipulating the jaw so that it looks like the corpse is talking.

I have to say, it’s some of the best acting Affleck has ever done.

Of course, nonsensical touches also abound. The most baffling of these is a late-inning attempt to give this whole circus some depth by spinning an impenetrable back story about a decades-old FBI undercover operation that went off the rails — and reveals the real reason Sparazza is so intent to have Buddy’s heart on a plate.

It doesn’t work; from start to finish, the film remains all style, no substance. Yet that’s true of so many action flicks these days that perhaps it’s time to toss that metric out the window and grade purely on style.

By that measure — and by virtue of the fact that it arrives smack in the midst of the movie industry’s annual post-holiday hangover, when chill, barren winds blow through the octoplex — “Smokin’ Aces” is a fine, if fleeting, diversion.