Film Muser Rating : 2.5 / 5
Release Date : January 26, 2007
Running Time : 109 minutes

The title Smokin’ Aces actually does a pretty good job of describing what this movie is about. Buddy ‘Aces’ Israel is a Las Vegas lounge performer turned mobster who has been offered full immunity and a spot in the witness protection program for his testimony against his criminal associates. The catch is that the crime bosses know what he is up to and put out a one million dollar hit on his head. With such a high bounty, the job attracts a number of notorious hit men and mercenaries – all who plan on ‘smoking Aces’. The movie follows Buddy Israel, the characters out to get him, as well as the team of FBI agents who are trying to secure him to make good on their deal. With such a recipe, its not tough to predict what direction this moves in – that’s right, lots of shooting, stabbing, and chainsawing.

The Tremors

The first twenty minutes of Smokin’ Aces is spent introducing the characters and setting up the story. There is a lot of names thrown around so you’ll have to pay attention, or you could find yourself scratching your head a little down the road. Not that the the film is complicated, but there were a couple times near the beginning that I needed to back the DVD up to make sure I was clear.

Once the story and characters are established, everyone starts to converge in Lake Tahoe at the hotel Buddy Israel is laying low in, and mayhem ensues. Smokin’ Aces is lined with a star-studded cast with Jeremy Piven playing the tragic Israel and Ryan Reynolds, Ray Liotta and Andy Garcia heading up the FBI team. Each team is in a race to reach Israel’s penthouse suite to make the kill and collect their bounty.

As I watched the film I got the sense that it was trying too hard to be clever. It seemed like the filmmakers were trying to inject a bunch of scenes that they hoped would go down as classics. It just didn’t seem natural. But as the movie progressed, I didn’t seem to notice as much as I got more into the story. I’m not sure if I was just distracted by all of the bullets flying. Near the beginning of the film I also got a vibe about a possible twist the story may take for a surprise ending. It seems that I was partially correct, but disappointingly the actual ‘twist’ seemed a little unreasonable.

Despite its shortcomings there are some great characters, especially among the mercenaries, as well as some cool action scenes with some interesting cinematography. The acting is solid, especially from Jeremy Piven and Andy Garcia. I think this is the first movie I have seen where Ryan Reynolds takes a completely serious role with zero sarcastic or smart-ass comments. I kept waiting for him to make some snide remark.

Memorable Scene
Slight Spoiler Alert – Jack Dupree (played by Ben Affleck) the bails bondsman out to collect Buddy Israel is going over his plan with two partners outside of his car by Lake Tahoe. Meanwhile three psychopathic neo-nazi brothers known as The Tremors who are also out to get Israel drive by and gun down Dupree and his team. The Tremors get out of their car and two of them, Jeeves and Lester, start to wrestle with each other. The third brother Darwin (played by Chris Pine) kneels by the dead body of Dupree and proceeds to have a conversation with it. If that’s not strange enough for you, Jeeves moves the dead body’s mouth and lends his voice so Dupree can offer his forgiveness.