The Family

Direction
Cinematography
Acting
Screenplay
Score
1.6

The Manzoni family are on the run from some pretty nasty people. The problem is they can’t seem to stay in one place for more than a month without giving the FBI reason to move them on again and it’s mainly because they’re a bunch of American assholes that fail to lay low despite the best efforts of their FBI minders. Giovanni (De Niro) alias Fred Blake, is a very angry man and it seems to have rubbed off on every member of the family. Wife Maggie (Pfeiffer) is an amateur demolition expert, daughter Belle (Agron) is as aggressive and violent as her father and son Warren (D’Leo) is a chip off the old block wheeling and dealing in his French high school in order to get ahead. As the family define themselves in the community as outcasts and assholes it’s not long before the bad guys show up to wipe them out. At this point you’ll think this can’t get any more absurd but it does and you’ll be chuckling at the bizarre finale that’s pulled straight out of a Michael Bay movie.”

The premise is quite good and in the right hands it could have been a decent film but the minute Pfeiffer blows up the local supermarket because the locals don’t kiss her ass it falls apart. All of the introductions to the family are totally unbelievable, De Niro being a violent ex-mob boss I can buy, his trophy wife and children being as violent and unhinged as him is unrealistic and silly. The light in the mess is Tommy Lee Jones as the rough old FBI agent and to be fair to him and De Niro their on screen time together remains entertaining throughout. It’s simply not enough though.

It’s sad when De Niro and Lee Jones can’t save a movie but that’s where this is at. Don’t waste your time.