Movie Review: Road to Perdition

We have a bookshelf next to our front door and every time I walk out the door this movie catches my peripherals. I’ve always wanted to see it and I decided today was the day. A gangster film starring Tom Hanks, Paul Newman, Jude Law, and Daniel Craig was not what I was expecting. You can see the trailer here.

Cover of Road to Perdition (Widescreen Edition)

Tom Hanks plays Michael Sullivan, a father during the early 1930’s who’s trying to provide for his family by whatever means necessary. His sons aren’t sure what he does and when the oldest son starts snooping around, he discovers the truth: his dad is in some shady stuff. Some events play out as a result of Michael’s son, Michael Jr., witnessing some mafia murders, and shortly after Sullivan and his son are on the run. While on the run, Sullivan and his son form a stronger father-son bond and you get to see more of their characters. The son, played by Tyler Hoechlin, does a good job of displaying his emotions as a twelve-year-old, someone who is forced to become a man but is still a kid at the same time.

Tom Hanks did the best he could with what he was given and at points I smiled, but this was not the movie I was expecting it to be. The story was slow. It is a drama and I understand that dramas can be slow-moving, but at times it was like the filmmakers didn’t know where they wanted to go with this one.

Once again, this is a drama so there weren’t a lot of action scenes. This isn’t a bad thing, but don’t think of this as a gangster movie. Think of this as a father-son bonding road trip that gets dangerous. A great cast was put together in Tom Hanks, Paul Newman, and a young Daniel Craig and Jude Law, but none are able to demonstrate their acting ability to the fullest in this movie. The script writing was just lacking and what was originally a good idea kinda fizzled out by the end. The bonding between Sullivan and his son is what keeps the movie going but you only get short glimpses of that relationship at some points, making the movie drag. With the cast they had, I was expecting more than this.

Once again, if you’re new to my blog,  I’ve always ranked movies on a scale of 0-100 (I don’t know why, I just always have). Here’s the grading scale.

 90-100  It’s a great movie and definitely one worth buying. (Iron Man 3)

80-89   It was a pretty good movie and definitely one worth seeing, but it doesn’t quite scratch my top ten percentile. (Star Trek Into Darkness, Now You See Me, Man of Steel)

70-79   It’s okay but I’ve seen better. It has its moments, but it has its flaws, too. (Oblivion)

60-69   It’s got plenty wrong with it but I still got enjoyment out of this one.

50-59   This movie isn’t intolerable but it’s not blowing my mind either. I’m trying really hard to get some sort of enjoyment out of this. (The Hobbit, After Earth)

40-49   This movie is just mediocre. It’s not doing anything other than the bare minimal, so morbidly boring that sometimes I’m actually angry I watched this.

30-39   Definitely worse than mediocre, the 30’s ironically define the 1930’s, full of depression, lack of accomplishments, poverty and just so dumb. (The Contract)

20-29   What did I just watch? Cliches, stupidity, nothingness, did I mention stupidity? Just…wow.

0-19      Watching this movie resulted in one or more of the following: seizure, loss of brain cells, falling asleep/unconsciousness, feel you wasted your time/day, accomplished nothing for you, left the movie knowing less about it then you did going into it, constantly asking yourself why you came to see this movie, or near-death experience. In short, staring at a wall was just as entertaining as watching this movie. This movie deserved a sticker or a label that said, “WARNING: EXTREME AMOUNT OF SUCKAGE.”

My score for Road to Perdition: 55.

The performances by Tom Hanks and Tyler Hoechlin kept this movie going. They made me care about the relationship and the characters. Newman, Craig, and Law’s roles were too small to make a significant impact, so half-decent actors probably could have played their roles and done as good a job. At the end of the day, it kept me watching, but there’s no doubt this movie was over-hyped by the cover.

*SPOILER ALERT* IF YOU DON’T WANT THE MOVIE SPOILED, STOP READING!!!

*SPOILER’S EDITION*

The ending to this movie made me very unhappy. They go to Michael Jr.’s aunt’s house and Michael Jr. sees a dog on the beach and runs to it as Sullivan walks behind, his face expressing the euphoric feeling of “I did it”(you’ll have to find out “what he did” by watching the movie). He walks into the house as Michael Jr. continues playing with the dog. He gets to the second floor and looks out the window at the sun’s reflection on the water and then gets shot in the back two or three times by Jude Law’s character, who was sent to kill Sullivan earlier in the movie and failed to do so twice. Michael comes up the stairs with a gun and gets the drop on Law (I don’t even know what Law’s character’s name is in this movie so for now on, he’s Law). He starts telling Michael to give him the gun and right when Law’s about to take the gun out of his hands, Sullivan shoots him in the back and kills him. Michael runs over to his dad and holds him in his arms as he dies.

To say I was peeved when this happened was an understatement. I know that life isn’t always a fairy-tale ending and I have seen plenty of movies with sad endings that I liked. However, this didn’t fly with me. This is partly because the relationship between the two that I have watched develop for the last two hours of my life is now over. The other reason is because Sullivan’s twelve-year-old son is now by himself with a dog and a car. They can’t end the movie like that, right?

Well surprise, they don’t. It gets worse. Earlier in the movie, Law shoots Sullivan in the arm and Michael drives away. Sullivan passes out and Michael stops the car on a road that appears to be in the middle of nowhere except for one house. Michael starts screaming for help and the elderly couple residing there takes them in, fixes up Sullivan, and let’s him rest and recuperate there. Apparently, they ask no questions about anything because there is nothing in the movie that hints at that. Well, Michael decides he’ll go back to that place and live there.

Wow. Really? He’s going to live with the only people in the whole movie with more than a minute of screen time that don’t die? Talk about tying up loose ends.

It’s an interesting watch, but don’t expect to finish this and be like “that was a Tom Hanks classic to add to the collection”, because it’s not.