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'Snatch' 151

Posted by JonKatz from the -tech-culture-movie-nodes- dept.
If a movie could have ADD, Snatch would be it. An eye popping, furiously-paced melange of graphics, jump cuts and freeze-frames, it's a black-humored (very black-humored) look at the underside of London, as experienced by an exotic band of thugs, promoters, thieves, gypies and hustlers. Warning: Plot is discussed but nothing is given away. Please add your own reviews, as usual.

Snatch is a wild, British version of Dick Tracy meets MTV.

People have names like "Bullet Tooth Tony," "Boris the Blade," "Brick Top" and "Franky Four Fingers." Shots get repeated; scenes are shown from different angles with different colored filters; characters whiz through so quickly it's impossible to keep track of them. It's not really clear whether Guy Ritchie (otherwise known as Madonna's new hubby) is going tongue-in-cheek all the way, aiming for a live cartoon, is giving us the bird, or if he's trying to slip in a serious or coherent movie between the rapid rat-a-tat of graphics, flashbacks, jerky, hand-held camera work and freeze-frames.

The so-called underside of London, also the setting of Ritchie's debut feature, Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, has become his directorial turf.

Seedy characters abound -- mumbling, scamming Gypsies, surly bookies, shady boxing promoter, gun dealers, thieving jewel merchants (Dennis Farina) -- all tangled in the complex plot that starts with the theft of a humungus stolen diamond and ends up see-sawing all over. Brad Pitt plays an incoherent Gypsy fighter and Benicio Del Toro a ne'er-do-well courier.

Definitely a hoot, the movie is also a bit disengaging, almost disorienting. You can't possibly know or care much about anybody in it, since nobody is onscreen for longer than a few seconds at any given stretch. And there's a big cast. The movie speeds past so quickly, shot in so self-consciously and intrusive (and fascinating, sometimes) a way, that the audience can end up feeling detached. Even the bitingly funny parts whiz by in a blur, and the humor here is beyond black, as in killing people in especially horrible ways.

Alan Ford nearly steals the movie, playing the joyously ferocious, all-purpose monster/gangster Brick Top, whose passion is chopping up his victims and feeding them to the pigs in "six pieces." If he's telling the truth about pigs' eating habits, then it's really foolish to dispose of bodies any other way.

The problem with Snatch is that for all the great acting, bravura cinematography and atmospheric British grunginess (there's a whiff or two of Trainspotting here), it explodes rather than unfolds, and it keeps on exploding for 105 minutes. It's dizzying, not boring -- and it's often very entertaining -- but sadly, it doesn't stick; an hour after leaving the theater, it's hard to remember it at all.
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Movie Review: Snatch More

Movie Review: Snatch

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  • snatch? (Score:1)

    by AoT ( 107216 )
    ok you think theyncould have given a better name, especially with madonna wearing the t-shirt all the time. Are they trying to convince people its pr0n.
  • After watching it I had a throbing pain in the front of my head, damn it keep the camera still.


    ________

  • I saw this movie a couple of months ago and I definitely recommend it. It's very funny and entertaining. The style is relatively unique; maybe something of a cross between Pulp Fiction and Trainspotting or something like that. If you like this movie, also be sure to check out Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, which is also by Guy Ritchie.
  • To see Brad Pitt get knocked the fuck out.
  • This movie was like The Blair Witch Project but with a lot more additude (read: trying to be cool). I saw it on Friday night and while I'm not still dizzy like most of the posters so far, I remember having to close my eyes during the movie. In fact, I didn't even have to do that during the BWP!
    ------------
  • i thought thte movie was great, nice plot, good jokes and masterfull acting/directing/producing. But i've always like Guy Richie and his style of film making.
  • I saw this last night (in the stupid first row) and Katz is right, this morning I can only remember a few of the scenes. And there's no way I could place their order. It was a great movie, but you could probably come up with a movie that was just as interesting by downloading 40 gig of 1 to 8 second porno mpegs, do a select all on that directory, and hit enter.
  • Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels [imdb.com] information can be found here. If you liked Snatch, go check this out.

    It's nice to see Bradd Pitt acting so well in the movie. The pretty boy all the girls drooled after has become a real actor! :)

  • I loved the movie. The cut-up style was fabulously done, and the plot was fun.
    There was nothing wrong with all the jump shots and I think that they definately added to the movie. Life is fast-paced and usually non-linear and I think Guy Ritchie captured that well. And how can you complain about all the killing in the movie. It was always portrayed in an amusing way.

    Be sure to see Lock, Stock and two Smoking Barrels too. It might even be better that Snatch

  • FYI (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    in case you didnt know, snatch is a slang term for a CUNT
  • I went to this movie a few days before christmas, and I enjoyed it all the way. The soundtrack fulfills the movie nicely, just like the previous guy ritchie-features, mainly Lock Stock and Two smoking barrels. The movie kinda resembles Lock Stock in several ways, many of the actors are back for more in Snatch after LSTSB. Vinnie Jones (Gone in 60 seconds recently) makes a good villain as always, harder and bader than ever.

    I also enjoyed seeing Brad Pitt in his role as a gypsy. The conversations between him and the rest of the crowd was a pleasure to enjoy with loads of enjoyment.

    The movie is a bit different, which is what makes it worth seeing. If you enjoyed Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, you're probably gonna enjoy this too, since they're similar in several ways. I'm however predicting that Guy has to evolve a bit more soon, or his style is going to become kinda boring.
  • I just saw Snatch two nights ago. My friend and I took two lady friends and lets just say it is a guy movie all the way. I don't think there was one chick there who wasn't smacking her sigificant other and whining about how terrible it was. At the same time I don't think there wasn't a guy there who thought it wasn't a great idea to feed your victems(abusive girlfriends who don't enjoy great action/comedy/whatever the fsck that was flicks) to pigs. One thing I noticed, after this and Fight Club, how can Brad pit get away with dressing the way he does, looking so thouroughly unwashed as he did, and most of the ladies leave the theater with tingles down below???

  • I've personally noticed that most of Jon's reviews don't match up with my perception of the film (after I've seen it.) He also seems to have this uncanny knack of posting a review for the film the day I plan to see it, which is really starting to freak me out.


    Seriously though, I'm not sure what Jon expects to get out of films- I'd like to know what he goes into the theatre expecting to see. I go to most movies that come out (a sad addiction) typically with rather low expectations, and sometimes I am rewarded by having a better-than-average experience seeing it.


    With regards to "snatch", I thought Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels was a fascinating and entertaining flick; I've also been happy with the work that Brad Pitt has been doing lately, taking strange character roles etc (Fight Club? 12 Monkeys?) so I expect it to be an interesting movie all around.


    Maybe it just has something to do with watching movies without a haze of pretension skewing my vision of everything. my two cents.

  • Re:snatch? (Score:3)

    by Boost Ventilator ( 34628 ) on Sunday January 21, 2001 @06:46AM (#492469) Homepage
    Snatch does have other meanings, ya'know....and you would have to be pretty misguided to think it was a porno after seeing a trailer or hearing about the cast that was involved. As far as I know, Snatch doesn't have the same vaginal meaning in England as it does over here (someone from across the pond might want to clear that up for us). Earlier on, I heard that it was going to be released in North America as "Snatch'd" but I guess they never had to change it. We all know that "shag" is not as casual an expression in England and the funny thing is I heard that "fanny" means exactly what we North Americans think "snatch" means on their turf.

    Overall, I thought the movie was a very flashy and funny and since it has a convoluted plot,
    would probably benefit from repeated viewings. Brad Pitt was great as a fast-talking, slack-jawed Pikey, Alan Ford was suberb as Brick Top, and Bencio Del Toro was probably the most underused actor in the mix.

    If you liked "Lock, Stock..." you will most likely enjoy this romp.
  • Snatch doesn't have the same slang meaning in Britain as it does over here. It just means "to obtain discreetly." But in the movie theater lines last night I could hear a million jokes a minute about the title. Someone up in the chain of producers didn't want to change the name of the movie when it came to the States, and thus it stuck.

    ---
  • Brad Pitt doesn't get knocked the fuck out in fight club...
    Norton shoots himself in the head and Pitt goes away, but Pitt doesn't get knocked the fuck out, ever...

    ---------------------------
    "I'm not gonna say anything inspirational, I'm just gonna fucking swear a lot"
  • I thought the movie was slow at the beginning and was wondering why the hell my friends dragged me to see it, but as it started to get going, the characters became easier to differenciate, the stories started to cross, and the jokes and speedups became so funny people had to "shhh" to keep the theather quiet from laughter. I don't know what Katz was talking about. The plot is easy to remember. The boxing match, the car wrecks, and the other important aspects of the plot are still with me and laughable. Definitely worthy to go see at least once at full price. I have a group of friends that see almost every movie that comes out. I see movies with them and then pick the good ones so my other group of friends, who don't have as much time to watch film, and I can see. This is definitely one of those good ones.

    ---

  • Leave it out, it's marvellous! (Score:3)

    by mattbland ( 260913 ) on Sunday January 21, 2001 @07:03AM (#492473)
    I'm sure that the majority of Americans just don't "get" good British films.... especially Katz.

    The comedy is dark, of course it is we're dealing with bloody villians who wouldn't look at, nevermind laugh at, Friends, Sienfeld or Fraiser.

    Bad people do bad things, and actually they can be very funny when looked at in this context. Key to this is the fact that they're always trying hard for things to work out right, but they never do.

    It's got spirit and character. It might not be everyones cup of joe, but it's not a mainstream film is it?

    All I can say is, if you don't like this film you're probably 'f#cked, proper f#cked'.

    p.s. keep an eye out for 'zee germans'!

  • Well, i have a different experience, all the girls i know that have seen Snatch, have loved the movie specially the different plot twists and the dark humor, maybe it has something to do with the fact that the french culture is more in sync with second degree british humor, OTOH maybe not, since some of them aren't french although some are from south america (like me) where second degree jokes are also prefered...

  • rLowe's Review .... :) (Score:4)

    by rlowe69 ( 74867 ) <ryanlowe_AThotmailDOTcom> on Sunday January 21, 2001 @07:25AM (#492475) Homepage
    Snatch was a good flick overall, and while it won't go down with other gory/badass/humour movies like Pulp Fiction or The Usual Suspects, it is still one of those movies you HAVE to see ... like a Trainspotting, because it is so damn interesting ...

    IMHO, there wasn't a lot of jittery camera movement. I think what people are talking about is the editing that was done ... some of the cuts go by so fast they will make your head spin (ie. the quick concorde flight from New York to London), but that's what makes this movie so interesting to watch ...

    As for the plot, sometimes it's nice to NOT KNOW what the hell is going on ... some directors like it better this way .... besides, the ending brought it together so nicely that it didn't matter if you didn't understand the whole beginning - you'll get it by the end.

    Definitely worth the 12 Canadian bucks. 8/10
  • "an hour after leaving the theater, it's hard to remember it at all."

    That's great! That just means you'll have to go see the movie again...
    --
    Peace,
    Lord Omlette
    ICQ# 77863057
  • Go see this movie. The humor was fantastic! I laughed soooo very hard! The film making was first rate as well. All around great film!

  • my two cents (Score:3)

    by Alien54 ( 180860 ) on Sunday January 21, 2001 @07:38AM (#492478) Journal
    If nothing else, it *might* retain a certain cult success in the rental market, just because of people with their DVDs going through the movie in slow motion just to see all of the details they missed.

    Since many folks don't need a headache when going out to see a movie, the word of mouth will be mixed at best. It is all right to have an artistic success, but if you make it hard for people to enjoy your movie, this will limit your commercial success.

  • I haven't seen the movie, but:

    You recognize that your parents' point of view is ridiculous, and that they are Luddites with no understanding of physics or technology...

    And you go on to discount everyone else in the world who doesn't believe in the same God you do.

    Fascinating; I'll respect your opinion if you'll respect mine, which is:

    "We are all free to do whatever we want to do."
    (from Illusions, by Richard Bach)

    If people want to go see this movie, let them. If you think that they're going to hell for enjoying it, go right ahead.
  • Well... close to it. Lou really does a number on him in the bar basement, if you recall.

    Just to get something across, though, I must say that the person that started this particular thread is beyond my realm of comprehension... I personally find Brad Pitt to be an excellent actor, and I don't see anything spectacular about him getting "knocked the fuck out". "A River Runs Through It", "Interview With A Vampire", "12 Monkeys", Fincher's "Se7en" and "Fight Club"... I thought he was great in each and every one of these movies. I don't think it's feasible to dismiss him as a boy-toy anymore, as especially demonstrated in the last two films I've mentioned.

    -AR
  • For what it's worth, a review I wrote some time ago that was going to be published in an on-line magazine that never quite made.

    Snatch 4.5 / 5

    Distributor
    Columbia Pictures

    Released
    1st September 2000

    "Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels" was released in 1998. Since then, we've heard more about Guy Ritchie's relationship with Madonna than his work in the cinema. The critics were out for blood when this one appeared--Ritchie had made it too big violating that sacred principle of Britishness: always playing at being the underdog--Ritchie couldn't play any more. He had become a film-making superstar and was living in "domestic" bliss with one of the world's entertainment superstars. He was asking for it. And he got it, if the slating that "Snatch" has received in almost every broadsheet daily is any indication.

    I'm not sure what the critics are complaining about. Their comments seem incongruous given the subject. Ritchie hasn't made such much made a film, as a live-action cartoon.

    The references throughout the film to scenes from Pulp Fiction and Reservoir Dogs should be quite easy to pick out: gangsters caught up in the role of being gangsters--from their names through to the way they speak--caught in a vortex of anger and hatred and violence from which the only way out is death.

    The film mocks what should be horrific: shooting, prize fighting, death threats and extortion. But the killings and shootings (at least for the first two-thirds of the film) are slapstick and no more dramatic than a keystone caper. No one can take seriously the sequence that begins with a car chase and ends up with Bullet Tooth Tony (Vinnie Jones) repeatedly shooting Boris the Blade (Rade Serbezija) who keeps muttering threatening invectives in a nod to the famous scene from Monty Python's "The Quest for the Holy Grail". In the meantime, Bullet Tooth Tony and Avi (Dennis Farina) have been in a car accident caused by Darren (Jason Flemyng) throwing Turkish's (Jason Statham) chocolate milk out the moving car window and obliterating the on-coming Bullet Tooth Tony's vision. Turning their heads to watch the accident, three pawn-brokers who much to their regret are involved in the action, don't notice the bound, gagged and blindfolded Boris the Blade stagger out into the middle of the road and run him over.

    The characters are drawn with thick, bold lines that give them no room for change or development (they all even wear the same clothes throughout the film). There are almost no women in the film (excepting four minor roles), the stereotypes are painted with an equally broad brush: everyone looks a fool. While the narrator, Turkish, is a passive spectator never quite seeming to believe that he's caught up in the events that he's in--almost as though he's aware that he's in a film... or, at least, of the opinion that he has about as much free will as a character in a film. When nagged by Darren for a solution to a particularly sticky dilemma, he swears and storms out of the caravan where they've been sitting, waiting, like the characters of so many an existential drama, for the revelation of the exact sequence of events that is going to bring about life's one inevitability: death.

    Casting Brad Pitt in the role of the Gypsy barn-knuckles boxing champion, One Punch Mickey was a stroke of genius on Ritchie's part. Pitt plays the part perfectly and seems to enjoy his stint outside of Hollywood and the unusual specter of a Hollywood star in a film that sees a European release long before it hits America. It not only demonstrates Ritchie's pulling power as a director but also the increasing might of the British and European film making industries. Ritchie's film is a success--not a masterpiece, but a success. Don't believe the anti-hype. Ritchie continues on in splendid form!

  • Re:snatch? (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Not as bad as "Free Willy", though :)

  • The dog (Score:1)

    by jrs ( 27486 )
    How could you forget to mention the Dog?! :)
  • You ever notice how every sitcom has to have a character who speaks with an english accent nowadays? Same with many movies. It's just the IN thing right now. This movie will definitely be a success then. It's packed with english accents and london slang, no doubt.
  • You made the same movie again! (e.g. Lock, Stock, Two Smoking Barrells)

    Ritchie annoys me. The guy is a total rich kid, straight from the fox-hunting estates of Somewhereshire, England. And here he is making a movie about the inner cities of London.

    Next we're going to see Dubya pen a screen play about how hard it is growing up poor.

    Ritchie's not getting my $7.50.

  • British Review (Score:5)

    by Sirch ( 82595 ) on Sunday January 21, 2001 @08:06AM (#492486) Homepage
    This film was in Britain about 4/5 months ago. I went to see it, having seen Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels about a month before.

    With Lock, Stock still relatively fresh in my mind ("Chill, Winstaaan"), I felt that the plots were the same - something gets stolen, everyone wants the same thing, it ends up in the hands of the characters that you want it to in the end, and it all works out. Forgive the mathematical analogy, but it's like the plots of both oscillate around the same, straight line.

    The intelligence, and humour of the film, though, lies in those oscillations. This isn't a film, it's a movie. It's there to be enjoyed, not endlessly analyzed. In that way, this is yet another successful Guy Richie movie.

    Quite a few of the characters in Snatch are played by well-known actors in Britain. Mike Reid plays basically the same character as he does in Eastenders, a soap opera. Vinnie Jones, ex-professional soccer player-turned actor (Lock, Stock and Gone in 60 Seconds) plays the same character as he did in Lock, Stock and on the soccer pitch.

    Whilst Snatch is full of stereotyping, it is still enjoyable, and hilarious. Brad Pitt puts in an excellent performance as the Irish gypsy bareknuckle fighter who won't take a fall.

    The end result is full of slick, fast editing and good cameos. The results of Richie's directing are far better than Richard Curtis' weak romantic comedies (Four Weddings and a Funeral and Notting Hill), and leaves you with a warm feeling inside - not an empty one, as Trainspotting, one of Britain's best exports, did.

    8.5/10 - Samey, but still fun.

    --

  • It IS a lot like Pulp Fiction and Trainspotting, for other reasons too (I saw it months ago cos I'm British!)

    It's like Pulp Fiction in its blackness and weirdness, and in fact this movie isn't non-linear (at least not to PF's degree).

    It's like Trainspotting in it's unglamourous presentation (grunginess is probably the right word) and attention to detail in accents, dialects etc.

  • The first movie (LSATSB) was absolutely excellent. And suffered from most of what you describe here, although apparently to a lesser extent.

    Thing is, though, LSATSB was really just a two hour long shaggy dog tale. It was entertaining, had no character developement to speak of, and the most excellent punchline ever.

    I haven't seen Snatch yet (the movie, that is), but if it's nearly as entertaining as the first, I'll love it despite the lack of character attention.
    --

  • ..was less funny but more coherent, I thought. Both movies remind of a time when british pop culture was it...doesn't seem true anymore.
  • I'd love to see a discussion of Fight Club? Did people like..according to surveys, young males loved it. But why? I liked it a lot, cept for the loopy ending..
  • Nother movie that didn't quite know how to end..does anybody but me see this problem? Movies just don't know how to end...Huge problem for Antitrust and others.
  • Well, we know of the "other" meaning of it, but much like "ass" we don't tend to use it. We've got enough words of our own :o)

    Anyway, the humour of the name has been well noted since it was released ... which was some time ago. Good to see the delay with American movies coming to Europe also works the other way round.

  • neat review, and right, but I thought Trainspotting was twice the movie at least. Why did it remind me so much of Trainspotting..really nothing like it..Was it the shooting style?

  • Can't imagine.. (Score:4)

    by JonKatz ( 7654 ) on Sunday January 21, 2001 @08:28AM (#492495) Homepage


    I've done a lot of dumb things in my life but I've never hired me..My opinion is no better or worse than yours, I suspect.

  • I don't know if I'd say it was sloppy, as skitsy..just keeps on moving so fast..it's neat, but I can't imagine it would stick with people like Trainspotting..


  • ..for this movie this weekend are so-so, according to nytimes online..


  • I have to say, the very idea is a bit jarring. Got to be Freudian..live with Dad..

  • I'd not thought of that, but it's an interesting comparison..BW was a lot more primitive, and this one a lot more gory.
  • How do you figure it's not a mainstream film? It's starring a bunch of world-famous "stars" and it's playing in every theatre in north america. Never mind that I've had to see the commercial on tv at least a thousand times so far... and transit posters...

    That's as mainstream as it gets, friend.

  • ...was just great. I didn't think it was the hopping back and forth between three stories that got to me, just the furious pace of the movie and shot style. It was entertaining for sure, but I wouldn't put on my best ever movies list by a long shot.
    Doesn't mean you're wrong, tho..That's whats amazing about movies..any 10 people will see the same one and have a completely different reaction.


  • Fun, but not brilliant, would be my phrase, and boy is AC right about Crouching Tiger..that would be on my list of best movies ever.


  • I'd have to say the thugs in this movie weren't glamorous especially, or anybody one would want to be..some of them were nice, but the fate of some of these people would, I would say, not entice anybody towards a life of crime.
    I think it's a very tongue in cheek movie.
  • in the two days since its been released, i've seen it twice. once with my ex-girlfriend. (which made it all the more anxious). that was on the release date. i saw it again on saturday, the day after release. well. i missed the part with the introduction to sol and vinny the first time around so i didn't notice that the 'dag' they had (you know the one who snatches everything of import.) was one and the same with the one turkish and tommy had for but a fleeting moment. at any rate. these sort of things are what i've come to expect from guy richie. the large car crash in the middle of the movie (i SOOOO called it, especially the part where boris gets hit by the car) is classic. i mean in lock, stock, and two smoking barrells there is the guy on fire scene. a smaller scale version of the latice of coincidence in snatch. which brings me to another point. everything in snatch is BIGGER. bigger stars. larger amounts of violence. more over the top characters. (hachet harry ain't got nothing on brick top in pure hardassness). my ex was sad to see benicio deltoro go so quickly in the movie, but i think it adds to the humor. one of the few movies where i think violence as a medium works. if you haven't seen it. see it. if you have seen it. see it again and again and again. look for every neat little thing. like cousin avi's I NY mug, and boris' I moscow mug. if you don't see it, sie germans may get you. and don't forget to get the cornflower blue caravan (fight club reference? ahem.) although not as groundbreaking as lock, stock (as its VERY similar) its much better due to lack of budget restrictions. see it. bye.
  • I'm sorry, but Katz is starting to review movies that just, I dunno, well, let's just say most of us probably skip over katz articles these days. I had to comment, because a review of Snatch on /. can only be topped by maybe katz's review of the next Rugrats movie, or perhaps Castaway or Family Man (for all I know he may already have reviewed those and I skipped them). Dungeons and Dragons, Antitrust, StarWars, X-Men, etc., I can see those reviews on here totally. But Snatch? How about Erin Brockovitch or whatever? Let's face it, some reviews belong on salon.com (their stock could use the help). Is katz getting paid per article? If so that would explain a hell of a lot.
  • It's a great movie. If you like cut'n'thrust gangster action with intriguing plot lines, see it.

    What I'm confused about this is the timing: this is old news. I saw this movie at the theater about four months ago. What's going on?

    Rob.

  • i dont see the connection between this film and "nerds" or "stuff that matters". the only thing these guys would do to geeks is grind their face into the dirt. i just don't see why this movie gets frontpage, whereas many others don't even get a mention. i'd rather keep them off of /. unless they have proper geek value.

    if you like this sort of humour and want to see something really funny, check out the sketch in this style on "the last fast show ever". :)

    Fross

  • Snatch, and another British movie to see (Score:4)

    by Tumbleweed ( 3706 ) on Sunday January 21, 2001 @08:54AM (#492508)
    I thought Snatch was very good, and quite funny. I was laughing my butt off throughout most of it. And I thought the ending was great! (wish the Concorde *really* flew that fast! :) The thing I thought when I walked out of that movie was, "That's what Quentin Tarantino _wishes_ he could do!"

    Another British movie I've seen recently is MUCH BETTER, though it's a vastly different type of movie - 'Billy Elliot'. This is a great movie about a young boy in a northern England mining town during a miner's strike. He secretly substitutes ballet lessons for his dad-approved boxing lessons, and winds up doing quite well. All hell breaks loose, of course, when dad finds out. Also during all this is a lot of trouble because of the miner's strike. The movie is filled with strange and fascinating (and likeable!) characters, and it's got a fantastic soundtrack (half of which are songs by T. Rex). An amazing movie, and easily my favourite British movie. Among my top 10 right now (though that list changes a lot). Definitely worth seeing, and that's also one I'll get on DVD once it's available.

    Another recent British movie that was quite nice is 'Saving Grace', about a widow who resorts to growing marijuana in her greenhouse to meet the mortgage payment. This is an hilarious movie, and well worth seeing.

    Everyone's seen 'Trainspotting' and 'The Full Monty', but the one most haven't seen is 'Brassed Off', another 'mining town on strike' movie, but this one has a twist - the company brass band is the main thing - Pete Postlethwaite is the band leader trying to keep the band together despite the town falling apart because of the mine shutdown. He manages to do so, and even gets the band into a competition. Things get more interesting when a newcomer to the band causes a stir - she's a woman! (gasp) Played by Tara Fitzgerald. The movie also has Ewan MacGregor (young Obi Wan, for you geeks). An excellent movie, among the best of the recent British efforts.

    I guess when all the musical talent left Britain at the end of the eighties, the talent moved over to the movie industry - there are some really excellent British movies these days.
  • Katz, you have got to get off the dope.. Snatch was definitely NOT so fast that you didn't get a chance to get to know the characters. Maybe it is bad to have ADD - but it's gotta be worse to be dead as a log.
  • ... JonKatz wrote it?
  • I heard a radio commercial for Snatch that literally [I'm not making this up] loudly proclaimed "SNATCH OPENS WIDE ON !!" I understand that their meaning was that it was going opening into wide distribution but it still made me piss myself laughing.
    -Rylfaeth
  • First of all, I would like to point out that my parents told me that our television was broken when I was a youth. They thought that it would have a bad influence on me. The endless, mindless drivel infecting my soul and turning me into a zombie.

    Obviously, this is totaly ridiculous. But, that does not mean that television is evil to watch. Now that I have a television, yes I do get turned into a zombie, but such is life!

    Not only is it conceivable that someone (other than Sat*n himself) enjoyed the film but many actually did, as evidenced by the comments above. Snatch was great fun, as was LS&2SB. How about suspending your disbelief for a while, take the film as it was meant to be taken and have fun.

    BTW. Does the * in Sat*n save me from eternal damnation?

  • C'mon, I like films, I see many. I even like guy Ritchie's films. But what relationship does Snatch have to the Slashdot community at large, other than there's enough slashdot readers that some of them will like movies? Ever hear of an engineering term called "scope creep"? Try and keep a little focus here, people. This is worse than Harlan Ellison writing a tv column reviewing Flipper in the 1960s just so he could give free advertising to the waterbed company that gave him the waterbed for free (part of the column that week was his admitting he took the waterbed as payola, part was a review of the Flipper tv series, and part was about the joys of screwing on a waterbed).
    Now if Katz's review had even tried to draw some kind of connection between the movie and the experiences/lifestyles/mindset/whatever of "the average /. reader", however lame or stretching of a point it might have been, I wouldn't have bothered writing this comment. But Katz didn't even try.
  • I liked Fight Club because of the idea that it is not our fault that we are Generation X. It's not our fault that we are disaffected or apathetic either. (It may well be, but Fight Club say's it's not.) The boomers revolutionised music for us, clothes, attitudes towards young people, they defined the 'teen' and pop, they did away with military service. We have had no wars to fight, we have no purpose.
    Fight Club says it's OK, and we buy into it, because it justifies our apathy.
  • That's the only thing I can think of. Oh well, that's what filters are for, unless your looking forward to his review of the next Rugrats movie (which actually would probably interest more of us than most of the stuff he seems to be writing these days) I think he is getting paid per article.
  • The book was better, but I thought the movie was a good translation of the work to screen. I've heard that Palahniuk wrote it tongue in cheek, but the central thesis (that half a generation of men raised without strong male role models have to slug it out with one another to recover their masculinity) is still pretty interesting and is, I think, what attracts the most critical attention to it. The reason young males loved it, of course, was because it has a lot of guys blowing things up and beating the crap out of one another.

    Plus, great plot twist, eh? Any time I read or watch something where it turns out at the end that I wasn't reading or watching the same story I thought I was, I'm hooked. There were enough hints along the way to make it fun when you finally realize what's going on.
  • With Lock, Stock still relatively fresh in my mind ("Chill, Winstaaan"), I felt that the plots were the same - something gets stolen, everyone wants the same thing, it ends up in the hands of the characters that you want it to in the end, and it all works out. Forgive the mathematical analogy, but it's like the plots of both oscillate around the same, straight line.

    Agreed.. Guy Ritchie seems to be a one-trick pony. But it's a hell of a trick.

  • Ritchie was far less concerned about making "Snatch" a classic than he was about making a really tight and enjoyable movie. And he did an excellent job. The breakneck pace is absolutely crucial; it just wouldnt be funny if we honestly had to feel sorry for poor dead Four-Fingers. It's much better to constantly think of him as the corpse in the tea cosy. The circular plot and manipulation of time (eg: the crash, the opening and endign scenes) keep us from taking the story too seriously; this is, first and foremost, a COMEDY. And a good one. I really wish there were more of these neo-noir comedies; any suggestions? (Is anyone else reminded of "Treasure Island" by the deliberate lack of females in this one and LSA2SB?) --------- girls like it too.
  • I thought it was a thoroughly enjoyable movie, but I am in the minority there (at least among my friends).

    and it wasn't because of the fighting. Now that I think of it, the whole movie could have been done without the fighting--any cult metaphore might have worked. Maybe not. I could have done without some of the fight scenes anyway.

    I thought it was very funny, I thought the acting was great--norton, pitt, and carter were excellent. I don't quite follow slashdot reader's problem with pitt. I couldn't stop laughing at meatloaf (now there is a quote to be taken out of context).

    The dvd is great, the commentaries are great, and some of the behind the scenes stuff was pretty neat.

    I went to the book store to take a look at the book... I scanned it briefly. It read pretty much like norton's narrative in the movie, so I decided not to buy that one. I did pick up another book by the same author (chuck something... palaniuk?) called "Invisible Monsters." It was the most terrible, awful, dumb plotted books I've ever touched. Ugh. I haven't looked at any of his other books, if he has any.
  • One of the actors was in Trainspotting...

    -HobophobE
  • Oh, and the loopy ending, incidentally, was changed from the book, where nothing blows up. I guess the director figured, hey, it's a movie, we'd better blow some stuff up.
  • First off, I loved Fight Club, not just because I have a personal stake in the whole mental illness thing, but it was a great story with an ending you'd never see coming. However, I cannot agree that it ever says that we are not responsible for who we are. If anything, it says quite the opposite. They understood the situation and they did something about it. I doubt you'd raise an army by telling them that it's okay to be apathetic.
  • I guess his skill is in dialogue. He's found one plot which works, so he's sticking to it - rather like a British pantomime. The plot's always the same, there are some new jokes, some old ones, but people like to watch them because they know the format and know what to expect.

    Re. your email address. Are you in the acting business? (For any reading this comment, Alan Smythee is a pseudonym for people who have worked on films/shows and don't want to be credited with it.)

    --

  • Is slashdot becoming a movie reviews site? comon you don't need to review every movie that comes out. Stick on topic Jon
  • Well who wouldnt love SNATCH! I know I love SNATCH! Critics love SNATCH!
  • I bet you spotted Val Kilmer in 'True Romance'.
  • Jon, for someone who seems to have such a hard-on for new media changing our lives, it surprises me to find all your replies just dumped in the top of the heirarchy in a row like this. Replying to posts the normal way would make this so much easier to read (and the poster would know you replied too, through their profile page).
  • could someone tell katz how to reply in a thread?
  • "I bet you spotted Val Kilmer in 'True Romance'." Heh. No. But I did hear what he was like during the shooting. Apparently no one in the Oxford Science labs was allowed to look at him as he acted the role of a fellow student? A truly appaling story.
  • Look, I had to reply...

    Snatch obviously means fanny.

    Just like I always keep my fags in the same drawer as my pants. (next to my socks)

    ithankyou
    jb
    (P.S "snatch of the day" is a famous folk song in Blighty too. Honest to god, guvnor)
  • Beign an english man, snatch is one of the greatest movies ever made. Its witty sense of british humour and sexual references make it a film, that you will want to watch many times. I infact saw it 4 times in the cinema, each time amazing. To call this Lock Stock 2, is incorrect, it has the usual Guy Richie directing style, and plot is well written and well directed. This film is the best british film ever made, it surpasses Trainspotting, because of the depth of plot. Shag. Being a student, this expression is very often used. And has become a constant slag word used in modern day.
  • Why do ppl keep comparing this movie to trainspotting? Sure it's in a similar setting and has some of the same elements, but it's much much much more like lock stock and two smoking barrels.

    The true beauty of this movie came from the fact that there were several unrelated things going on at once which all get tied together by one little thing. Then the end just brings all the loose ends together perfectly!

    It was very entertaining but it's not a movie for everyone. It's an engaging movie which brings you in and keeps you in for the whole ride. I don't know what katz is smoking, but two days later me and my buddies are STILL talking about it! I gotta get it when it comes out on DVD!

  • First a few things about Snatch. There was no real plot, and no real characters. The editing, while fast and furious, was just not well done. Watch "Requiem for a Dream" for a recent example of well done fast cuts. Guy Ritchie tried to make a whle film out of the "ironic mishaps" ending of "Lock, Stock", and it just dosn't come off..

    The music was mixed entirely too loud, and in some scenes actually drowned out the actors.. after the brilliant soundtrack to "Lock, Stock", I was not happy..

    Second, PLEASE stop comparing all British films to Trainspotting, and crime films to Pulp Fiction. If you do so please at least try to explain why you feel they are similiar. There was nothing in style, emotion, content or anything else in common with Snatch and Trainspotting.
  • Finally, someone who agrees with me! Seriously, I find it hard to believe that all of these supergeeks can't handle some fast paced editing and scene cuts and your Linux hacking uber-brains can't keep track of a dozen characters! This movie was fantastic, but that's my opinion. It was, however, able to be understood and comprehended by even the normal man. The only thing I could understand with this movie was what the fuck those Pikeys were saying, but I found that hilarious.
  • Fight Club is tied with Natural Born Killers as my all time favorite movie. I thoroughly enjoyed both the book and the movie, although to be honest, I liked the ending in the movie better than the book (first time ever that i've liked something about a movie more than the book). It's not just about a generation of men raised by women. It's also about a society that brainwashes people into being a consumer slave for 40 years so they can buy shit they don't need.

    I think it speaks to a much broader audience than young men. I know a lot of young women who also loved the movie.

    Something else. Remember when Tyler says "I didn't create some loser alter-ego to make myself feel better"? Well, I can see a very real possibility of people who SEE what Tyler saw (that is that we are all just cogs in the great capitalist clockwork) creating a loser/slave personality to be able to deal with all other people who DON'T get it.

  • Human Traffic [imdb.com]. Drugs, music, the reality of working shit jobs, it's all there. And if you're american, a taste of what Wales is actually like these days..

  • There's no good reason to attach this historical baggage to the director. He may have grown up a rich kid, but this movie isn't about the hardships of growing up in London's ghettos, it's a comedy, plain and simple. Perhaps he does it so well *because* Richie knows nothing about living poor, and thus has a completely different perspective on the seedy side of life. Would you attach the same criticism to a director who grew up poor and did a comedy about moronic rich people?
  • Lock, Stock was a much more natural film - it was quirky, but unforced.

    Snatch has a lot of quirks, but it's too self-conscious about trying to relive Lock, Stock's success. It throws a million jokes at the wall to see what sticks, and the result is a very laboured exercise. Many of the jokes work, but too many don't.

    I recommend Love, Honor, and Obey as a far better movie in the british gangster comedy genre.
  • As I sit here browsing as 2+, I notice that half the posts are from katz himself...doesn't he already have enough karma? Why pull the publicity stunt, other than to see himself write.
  • Nice Troll!
  • I agree. It feels like British comedy played up for the American market.

  • We all know that "shag" is not as casual an expression in England and the funny thing is I heard that "fanny" means exactly what we North Americans think "snatch" means on their turf.


    But the real funny one is fanny-pack (aka bumbag) (Actually, they're both pretty funny. My brother was using bumbag as an insult for many years)
  • Um, Jon. You *do* understand the whole threaded discussion thing that's going on at Slashdot, right? Like when you see a post that you would like to reply to, you reply to *that* post, not the top of the discussion, right? There are about 10 posts from you here that are replies to your original story, rather than under whatever it is that you're talking about. Either that or you have some sort of keyboard Turrett's Syndrome that just spews random strings into Slashdot. So you either need 1) Education as to how Slashdot works or 2) medical attention. Please go and seek out the appropriate assistance because *god knows* I want you to get better!
  • I think you're the one who should be educated as to how slashdot works. The post Katz replied to has a score of 0, so obviously you were browsing with a threshold higher than 0. Therefore, you couldn't see it, but you could see Katz's reply which has a score of 2.
  • Warning: Plot is discussed but nothing is given away.

    I don't see why that requires a warning. How about: "As always, plot is discussed but nothing is given away."
  • Jon, Jon, Jon,

    Spend some time in the East End, Guy Ritchie isn't doing fantasy in these movies.

    He's just picking from the rich tangle of urban legend.

    An evening spent in any pub East of Canary Wharf would yield a similar slew of characters

  • It was a lot better thatn all this other crap coming out these days, the Screamn series for example. If you don't remember the movie after leaving the theater then it seems you just weren't paying attention. It seems as though you have complaints because the movie didn't drag on forever with little plot. The movie never let the audience get bored and that's what made it fun and exciting. It's certainly money well spent to go see this movie. And surprisingly, the Madonna song actually fit well into the movie.
    So there...
  • "If you liked "Lock, Stock..." you will most likely enjoy this romp."

    Yes, indeed. It's almost the exact same movie, with a slightly different plot, and even faster turnarounds in the story. Although very entertaining!

    "Got anything to declare?" *lol*

    --

    "I'm surfin the dead zone
  • I agree, very similar plot to Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels. IMO, Snatch isn't quite as good, but I probably feel that way becuase it doesn't have the originality of Lock, Stock. It's well worth seeing though.

    If I was feeling cynical I'd say that Richie made this movie (and cast Brad Pitt in it) to have a second go at the US market since Lock, Stock didn't enjoy the same success in the US that it did in the rest of the world.

  • I think "not knowing how to end" is the curse of the independent film. Mainstream Hollywood blockbusters can be utterly unoriginal, but you usually get the standard conflict-climax-resolution formula that we tend to expect from stories. (At least in the Western world.) After a lot of independent films, I'm left asking "Why couldn't they combine that level of cinematic originality with just a little viewer-friendly Hollywood polish on the story?"
    ----
    "Here to discuss how the AOL merger will affect consumers is the CEO of AOL."
  • Oh, he's a great actor. I just hate him. It's something about growing up when he _was_ a boy-toy while hearing every girl you know gush about him constantly. Nothing against him, but his looks came before his talent. He's just another Hollywood whore who used his looks to launch his career. I'm not alone in this feeling, I remember many of my friends saying the same thing when Club came out.
  • As I sit here browsing as 2+, I notice that half the posts are from katz himself...doesn't he already have enough karma? Why pull the publicity stunt, other than to see himself write.

    Jon's immune to karma laws. They told us this last century. Basically, he can post at +2 and no matter how bad the comments are, we can't mod him down.

    I'm not saying this is right, it's not, but that's the system we live in.

    All that, though, does not excuse the fact that the only two links are for stories by Jon, not links to the movie's producers, editors, filmhouse, actors, or prior movies by any of the aforementioned.

    If you're going to have a discusssion, you post relevent links. Otherwise, it's just a talking head greedfeed.

    But, hey, what do I know, I'm just a lifetime member of Cinema Seattle, I probably only see 200 movies a year, it's not like anyone else knows as much about movies as Jon does.

  • Refer to an ancient Brit flick "Kind Hearts and Coronets": "Impatient to become a duke, the ninth in line (Dennis Price) deicdes to eliminate the eight relatives standing in his way in this tart black comedy." Alec Guiness dies 8 quite amusing deaths - and it's in the form of a flashback diary written by a man about to be executed, with an every funnier twist at the end.
  • That's good to know, thanks.

    I thought Pitt did well in Snatch, and in Fight Club which was a similar role in some ways.

  • I think it was less the shooting style and more of the "I don't give a damn" British attitude that was prevalent in both films. Not that all Brits have this attitude, but most of the players in both movies did. :)

    Trainspotting's shooting style is more regular (even the hallucination and chase scenes are filmed quite normally) I think, than Snatch's . But I think that's more of a function of Trainspotting not needing the fancy schmancy editing and filming to entertain the audience. IMHO, Trainspotting is the better movie but they are quite different. Trainspotting is almost a serious movie and Snatch is definitely a comedy (with a side-order of action maybe - pass the mayo).

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