Gangster No. 1 (2002)

Hi, my name is Paul McGuigan. I have directed a film called Gangster No. 1 that I hope you will take the time to watch. It is about an utter amoral bastard. This film charts his progress from being an utter amoral bastard in thrall to David Thewliss's character to being an utter amoral bastard on top of the crime world until finally he becomes an utter amoral bastard about whom we are suddenly supposed to feel sorry for because nobody loves him. The acting in it is stellar, of course, seeing as how my cast includes Thewliss and Malcolm McDowell and Paul Bettany, who are all fine actors, plus Saffron Burrows is in it and even though she's not a good actress at least she tries. My direction is restless and stylish and quasi-avant-garde -- some snide, jaded critics would say that I am showing off in an attempt to disguise the empty preening void at the heart of my film but I think that they are misguided. It has many exciting scenes of violence including one where a brutal and disgusting murder is set to a corny pop song which I still think is an interesting and ironic stylistic device even though it has been run into the ground over the past ten years post-Reservoir Dogs. At the end of the film, I do something interesting by trying to justify the audience's having spent an hour and a half of their lives with this total rotter by turning him into a pathetic figure but since that didn't work in Chopper it doesn't really work here either but what do film critics know anyway. Don't listen to the film critics. I think that you will enjoy my movie very much.

Grade: C