BEFORE: John Travolta carries over from "From Paris with Love" and here are the links that will get me to Easter: Connie Nielsen, Pedro Pascal, Ving Rhames, Samuel L. Jackson, Michael Rapaport, Kevin Carroll, Roger Guenveur Smith, Carol Sutton, Jason Davis, and Tiffany Haddish. That's only enough to reach 4/20, which is Easter, but I WILL reach Big Movie 5,000 sometime before that. I'll have to take some time in a week or so and figure out some connections to get to something for Mother's Day.
THE PLOT: The story of crime boss John Gotti and his son.
AFTER: The days are longer now, I'm at home more often because I'm skipping out on one job, I won't exactly say I'm doing the trendy "revenge quitting" thing, but at least I know what it feels like. And hopefully the old boss knows now how valuable I was, even if he didn't realize it at the time, he might be starting to get some idea. Soon payroll deposits will be late, insurance policies could be cancelled, and fines and penalties will start to increase, those are the sort of things I was keeping an eye on. Oh, sure, sometimes I paid the withholding taxes late, but at least I made sure they were all paid eventually, and nobody left at the studio knows how to do that. He asked me to teach "accounting" to someone else before I left, but that stuff took me YEARS to learn, especially payroll, and I told him I simply could not teach it to someone else in an afternoon, such a thing was impossible. Am I a bad person for not training my replacement? With 31 years at that job, with me taking on new responsibilities again and again, I thought I was making myself irreplaceable, and maybe I was doing that, my mistake appears to be not telling the boss how irreplaceable I was. Eh, he never listens to me anyway, so really, not my fault, because it's not my company - I was just a hired hand for 31 years. Do we blame the navigator when the ship runs aground, or the captain for not listening to him?
Anyway, it's a bit weird that this film falls on today's schedule, not because it's April Fool's Day but because today I was also dubbing "Oppenheimer" to DVD, so I'll always have a back-up copy if I should want to watch it and it's not available on cable or streaming. I know, it's silly because maybe 98% of all movies ever made are streaming or being broadcast somewhere, somehow, but still, I like the security of having a copy if I want to re-watch it, which I probably never will. Who even has time to watch a movie a second time if so many new movies are always being released? Maybe when I'm officially retired and have even more free time (if that ever happens) I can re-watch all the movies I have on DVD before the final curtain. But let me try to stop being morose for a second.
The connection between "Oppenheimer" is that they both use the same non-linear storytelling format, or "time-jumping" in laymen's terms. What's odd is that "Oppenheimer" is generally regarded as a "good" movie, it did win the Best Picture Oscar after all, while "Gotti" did not win that award, and was instead nominated for several Golden Raspberry rewards, making it a "bad" movie, though I realize these terms are subjective and open to interpretation, and if you prefer "Gotti" over "Oppenheimer", well, who am I to judge, except that you're very wrong and I'm very right. Now I will admit that there may have been some kind of point to letting Mr. Oppenheimer's bio-pic spool out in three different eras, and then jumping between the eras as they each advanced forward, so it wasn't completely random, the film was just portraying three different parts of his life mixed together, and the scenes from each era were in proper narrative order, only mixed with the other two timelines in order to create some kind of deeper meaning through juxtapositioning. (OK, OK, at some point I will re-watch "Oppenheimer", it's just not even my favorite Christopher Nolan film, both "Tenet" and his Dark Knight trilogy are way better, IMHO.). "Gotti", on the other hand, seems to prefer to present all of its scenes in random order, which suggests that the film just wasn't working as a linear narrative, and the director or editor instead decided to just cut the raw footage into scene-long strips, throw them all up in the air and then edit the segments together as they were picked up off the floor. Don't say it isn't possible...
But as a result, there is no deeper meaning created here, you will not gain any particular insight, intended or unintended, by viewing this movie's scenes in the order they are presented to us. There's a scene from Gotti's later life, when he's incarcerated and stricken with cancer, and this could be followed by a scene from earlier in his mob career, when he's in jail for three years and being waited on hand and foot by corrupt prison guards. One minute he's uniting the five families, the next he's grieving the loss of his 12-year old son after a car accident. A lot of things happen, but given the randomness of it all, it's impossible to create a workable timeline to organize them all, or determine any reason for THIS event to be seen after THAT event, and before THAT OTHER one. Why, why, why? What information was I supposed to learn about the man that I missed because somebody else couldn't be counted on to organize it all properly?
I knew I was in trouble as soon as I saw the opening vanity logo from EFO, that's Emmett Furia Oasis Films, and this production company made a whole bunch of those cheapo Bruce Willis action movies I watched a few years ago, like "First Kill" and "Hard Kill" and "Reprisal" and "Extraction". The company made a few non-Bruce Willis films like "Empire State", "The Frozen Ground" and "Force of Nature", but before filing for bankruptcy protection in 2018, they seemed to follow a business plan focused on quantity rather than quality, because why make one "Escape Plan" movie when you can make three? I guess I shouldn't be too hard on them, because they did release "16 Blocks" and "End of Watch", but those will only get you so far, and their company should be judged by its entire output, which is probably 75% schlocky action movies.
What's worse about "Gotti" is that it fills the movie with mobster characters that did exist and we have heard about - like Vincent "The Chin" Gigante, Paul Castellano and Sammy "The Bull" Gravano. However, there's no time spent getting to know any of these real-life characters, obviously they wanted to focus on John Gotti, but then why mention all those other people at all? Gigante was known for wandering around Greenwich Village in his bathrobe and slipper, in an apparent attempt to make everyone believe he was mentally impaired, and thus not mentally fit to stand trial for racketeering charges in 1990. It wasn't until 2003 that he admitted he was only pretending to be crazy - but damn it, THERE'S a movie, right there, did anyone even try to make a movie about him? Just call it "The OddFather" and it practically writes itself. Oh, well, I just looked it up, I guess he's been portrayed in a few mob-based miniseries, like "The Deuce" and "Godfather of Harlem", and also in the recent theatrical film "The Alto Knights", still playing at your local AMC or Regal Cinema.
The most helpful thing in understanding "Gotti" might be the film's Wikipedia page, which breaks down the different years portrayed in the film, and from there you might be able to assemble a working timeline for most of the scenes. The earliest year shown is 1973, when Gotti, part of the Gambino crime family, is given the assignment of killing gangster James McBratney, who was thought to have kidnapped and killed Carlo Gambino's nephew. Gotti is seen murdering McBratney at a bar, and a year later is identified as the killer and sentenced to four years in Green Haven. However, during this time he is allowed to have "medical furloughs" and pretended to visit a dentist for long oral surgery sessions, and apparently would slip out the back door, commit another murder and then return to the dentist's office in time for his return to prison.
He was released from prison in 1977, which was only awkward because he had to figure out where his wife Victoria and their children had moved to, but after some effort he found their house in Howard Beach, Queens. At this point he rejoined his old crime associates and was declared a "made man". Fast forward a bit to 1979, when he and his former childhood friend Angele Ruggiero were operating out of the Bergin Hunt and Fish Club, and his oldest son, John "Junior" Gotti entered a military academy. In 1980, his middle son Frank was struck by a car and killed, and a couple months later the driver disappeared and the only witness to his abduction from a diner suddenly remembered that he didn't see anything happen.
Skip ahead to 1985, when Junior decides he doesn't want to go to military school any more, but instead wants to join the family business, however he started a bar brawl that resulted in a man's death. Gotti senior also decides that boss Paul Castellano is too old and frail to lead the family, however at the same time FBI wiretaps of Gambino family meetings reveal Gotti's involvement in labor racketeering. Gotti goes on trial but avoids conviction, however he also learns that his associate "Willy Boy" Johnson has been an informant since 1966, Gotti says he forgives Johnson for betraying the family, but a few months later, Johnson also goes missing.
Then comes the big shoot-out at Sparks Steak House in Manhattan, during which Paul Castellano is killed before he could reorganize the family and disband Gotti's crew. Gotti takes over the Gambino family, and a rival boss, Vincent Gigante tries to take him out, but fails and Gigante's associate, Casso, also survives a hit and tracks down and kills the hitman.
Moving ahead again, in 1987 Gotti is prosecuted for the third time, and earns the nickname "The Teflon Don" when he skates yet again. Also Junior Gotti joins the Gambino family. Then in 1992 Gotti goes on trial for the fourth time, charged with Castellano's murder, and this time Sammy Gravano testifies against him, and he's convicted and sentenced to life without parole. In Gotti's absence, his son Junior assumes control and but he's arrested in 1998, then during his prosecution he's offered a plea deal, and that's when he visits his father at the U.S. Medical Center for Federal Prisoners, which is very nearly the first scene of the film, even though it takes place chronologically last. (Except for Gotti dying from throat cancer, that should be the end of the film only it takes place about 80% of the way through, and that makes no sense.)
John Gotti should have been the focus of the film the whole way through, but by the end it kind of feels like Junior was the lead character, and really, who cares about him? Sure, the FBI put him through five trials between 2002 and 2009, but again, so what? This film is pretty much a hot mess throughout, so who is really surprised that it ends in a very confusing way? I could not make heads nor tails of it at all, not until working out the timeline as listed above, with the assistance of Wikipedia. Sure, the movie puts the dates up on the bottom of the screen, which is slightly helpful, however the whole film just needed to be organized better, or I'd settle for even organized at all. Glorifying John Gotti and his actions isn't this movie's worst problem, the worst problem is being so damn hard to follow.
Directed by Kevin Connolly (last seen in "The Ugly Truth")
Also starring Spencer Lofranco (last seen in "Unbroken"), Kelly Preston (also carrying over from "From Paris with Love"), Pruitt Taylor Vince (last seen in "Beautiful Creatures"), William DeMeo (last seen in "First Kill"), Leo Rossi (last seen in "Narrowsburg"), Chris Kerson, Stacy Keach, Chris Mulkey (last seen in "Girlfriend's Day"), Nico Bustamante, Sal Rendino (lastr seen in "Dumb Money"), Tyler Jon Olson (last seen in "Force of Nature"), Luis Da Silva Jr. (last seen in "Paterson"), Victor Gojcaj (last seen in "Ambulance"), Michael Cipiti, Ashley Drew Fisher, Jordan Trovillion (last seen in "Setup"), Nik Pajic (last seen in "Carol"), Greg Procaccino, Donald John Volpenhein, Andrew Fiscella (last seen in "After the Sunset"), Megan Leonard (last seen in "Arsenal"), Rhys Coiro (last seen in "Finding Steve McQueen"), Carter Anderson, Silas Mayers, Kealy Welage, Grace Sena, Lydia Hull (last seen in "Precious Cargo"), Jonathan Rau (last seen in "The Taking of Pelham 123"), Michael Spagnoli, Robert Pavlovich, Charles Carnesi, Jordan Jacinto, Michael Woods (last seen in "Omen IV: The Awakening"), Jay Seals, Ashley Cusato (last seen in "Escape Plan 2: Hades"), Shea Buckner (last seen in "Arsenal"), Brett Wyman, Joe Gelchion (last seen in "The War with Grandpa"), Joseph T. Deters, Ruthy Froch, Tony Luke Jr., Connor Cadek, Cristina Carone, Richard Doone (last seen in "Dark Waters"), Jeff Ruby, Kevin W. Shiveley, Nick Stanner (last seen in "Goosebumps"), Kyle Stefanski (last seen in "Acts of Violence"), Ken Strunk (last seen in "Reprisal"), with archive footage of John Gotti (last seen in "Where's My Roy Cohn?"), John Miller
RATING: 3 out of 10 anachronistic Pitbull songs
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