Road to Perdition

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Road to Perdition

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Road to Perdition

Tyler Hoechlin, Tom Hanks, Paul Newman, Daniel Craig, Jude Law, Jennifer Jason Leigh

In Road to Perdition, Tom Hanks plays a hit man who finds his heart. Michael Sullivan (Hanks) is the right-hand man of crime boss John Rooney (Paul Newman), but when Sullivan's son accidentally...( read more  read more... ) witnesses one of his hits, he must choose between his crime family and his real one. The movie has a slow pace, largely because director Sam Mendes (American Beauty) seems to be in love with the gorgeous period locations. Hanks gives a deceptively battened-down performance at first, only opening up toward the very end of the film, making his character's personal transformation all the more convincing. Newman turns in a masterful piece of work, revealing Rooney's advancing age but at the same time, his terrifying power. Jude Law is also a standout, playing a hit man-photographer with chilling creepiness. This movie requires a little patience, but the beautiful cinematography and moving ending make it well worth the wait. --Ali Davis

Id: 11001014

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Road to Perdition Recent Reviews
  • SirPant
    September 18, 2009
    SirPant
    Overall I was quite disappointed with this film, mainly due to being a big fan of the comic and the fact it was hyped up to be the best thing since sliced bread by most film review magazines.
  • irisheyes686
    September 6, 2009
    irisheyes686
    It was a little slow and boring at times, but it was a pretty good movie otherwise.
  • RossCollinsUK
    April 26, 2009
    RossCollinsUK
    A great Tom Hanks movie where you really feel for the characters. The second-half is thrilling, but I was disappointed by the ending that just felt too contrived and predictable.
  • bradwest
    February 15, 2009
    bradwest
    Something different for Hanks, Newman and Craig. A not bad adaptation of the graphic novel.
  • EarthlyAlien
    January 18, 2009
    EarthlyAlien
    "Natural law. Sons are put on this earth to trouble their fathers."

    Fathers and sons. Sin and redemption. Crime and punishment. Hanks and Newman. The big issues - as well as the big stars - are huge in Road to Perdition. Greek tragedy huge. Godfather giganti...( read more)c. Scaled to be visible to bestowers of film awards even six months hence. Hanks plays Michael Sullivan, a brooding Catholic hitman who comes home from work to his aproned wife and two young sons in their middle-class home outside of Chicago as weighted down with masculine mournfulness. Sullivan works for John Rooney (Newman), a Mob boss who loves Sullivan like the son he wishes he had; Connor (pre-Hollywood fame Daniel Craig), the son Rooney does have, is a weakling, a hotheaded crybaby as reckless with entitlement as Joaquin Phoenix's Commodus in Gladiator.

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    Sullivan accompanies Connor on a mission that goes bad when Connor, in a rage of impatience, kills a man he's meant to assuage, and Sullivan backs the boss' kid like the loyal soldier he is. Tragically, inevitably, and pulpily (the story is based on a graphic novel written by longtime ''Dick Tracy'' strip writer Max Allan Collins and illustrated by Richard Piers Rayner), Sullivan's older, 12-year-old boy, Michael Jr. (Tyler Hoechlin) has sneaked along for the ride, sees the killing, and sees that Connor sees him. The resulting tragedy of retaliation, escalated by John Rooney's tormented loyalty to his blood son, sends both Michaels on the road, partly to escape, partly to avenge, but mostly, in the way of American secular film Bible stories, to atone. Father and son are thus brought closer to heaven by the father's damnation and the son's prayers for closeness with the old man.

    ''Perdition'' means hell, true. But it's also - in the way of Americans with a dry sense of humour - the name of the corn-fed Midwest town the Sullivans head for. And for all the darkness (and rain, lots of rain) called forth to convey the agonies of a man who, like most men, is soaked with moral conflict, Sam Mendes and screenwriter David Self promise that the sky will turn blue if only fathers can break the cycle of visiting sins on the heads of their boys. Weep for the Sullivans in this sumptuous and predigested, top-quality and overdetermined, serious and easy-reader film, Mendes encourages, but do not despair for them because - as in Mendes' immaculate directing debut, American Beauty - it's always darkest just before the catharsis. And catharsis, sweetened with Thomas Newman's score that echoes the plinks and tinkles of his work in ''Six Feet Under,'' is guaranteed.

    Certainly Hanks and Newman are radiant with the blessings of unstoppered talent, two greats from two generations who each understand the power of underplaying and sharing the treasures of the late Conrad L. Hall's exquisite cinematography. Hanks - fleshed out, stolid, with a sad mustache - gets to fire a gun not because he's a great soldier but because he's a murderer, and he brings to a morally compromised character the same intelligence he lavishes on more heroic roles. He also works generously with Hoechlin, loosening the novice actor's forgiveable knots.

    Meanwhile Newman - sunk in, flinty, with angry spectacles - gets to order a hit, and play every one of his 70-something years in what is surely his best performance from Nobody's Fool, in '94, till his death. The bad-guy stuff does the pair good, and when Rooney and Sullivan beam at each other quietly, bonded by pure love and crooked killing, the two performers are so pleasing to watch, you want to nudge a neighbour and nod approvingly; in a pretty, flourish scene where Sullivan and Rooney wordlessly play a piano duet, the appropriate response is, ''Ooooh, Hanks and Newman!''

    For good measure, the duo are joined by a crucial third model of evil, this one a conscienceless crime photographer called Maguire, played by Jude Law with a bent spine and stained teeth. While the lead gangsters at least wrestle with right and wrong, the man from the media has no such compunction; he'll kill to get the picture if need be, and still have no problem sleeping at night. In the future he might be an android gigolo. Or Errol Flynn.

    In 2002 I watched Road to Perdition in the same week as Minority Report, which made that a prestige-studio-film summer of fathers reaching out to sons, sons forgiving fathers, and mothers pretty much vanishing from the picture after dinner is served. There's much that's simplistically touching, optimistic, and appealing in the filial trend, just as there's much that's simplistically grand, worthy, and fine in Road to Perdition. If I yearn for less measured filmmaking that cries out with more reckless despair, it's because I think hell on earth is a meaner, much more interesting, and far less tidy cinematic place than Mendes trusts his audience to handle. When all the (film) stars in heaven are aligned, why settle for the road to happiness?
  • Topsie11
    November 4, 2009
    Topsie11
    Wow, this movie was absolutely brilliant . The acting, direction,and story with excellent cinematography make this film worth watching. beautiful movie about the love between father & son. jude law is good as well.. he played his role perfectly. Hanks also very effective in ...( read more)his role. Tom Hanks gives an Oscar-worthy performance. I really liked it. i really cried. highly drama. the mark of a true classic see for yourself
  • ahhh1989
    November 1, 2009
    ahhh1989
    One of Tom Hanks' best performances. The film is stylish, brutal, and incredibly moving. One can't help but appreciate the themes that this film at least takes the time to explore.
  • zdravkoduck
    October 21, 2009
    zdravkoduck
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  • trisarahtops22
    October 21, 2009
    trisarahtops22
    I liked this film a lot. It was very dark and brutal but the actors made it work. Tom Hanks was excellent, as he usually is, and really draws you into the story. Everything about this film worked.
  • rajanaufal2
    October 18, 2009
    rajanaufal2
    Sam Mendes strikes again after his 1999 success "American Beauty" and creates much more than another simple crime movie. He decides to center his caracters and story on the Irish mafia, and its hitman Michael Sullivan who was betrayed by his closest friends. We follow michael, p...( read more)layed by Tom Hanks, fleeing over the country seeking revenge. The mastering of the movie is the filmmaking, noting the spellbinding violent scenes, powerfully achieved by Mendes. Hanks did his job pretty well, but it definitely were Jude Law and Paul Newman who stole the picture with outstanding supporting performances. In the end, we knew for sure that american beauty wasn't a lucky coincidence and that we gained a very powerful director and filmmaker.
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