The Boondock Saints

This review of The Boondock Saints was requested by Pete.

The Boondock Saints (1999)

Director: Troy Duffy
Writer: Troy Duffy
Genre: Action/Drama/Crime/Thriller

It has been a few months since I saw The Boondock Saints, but I still remember it pretty well cause it was so good.

Story

Two brothers in Boston kill two mafia members while trying to defend themselves and feel it was a calling from God. There calling is to rid the world of the mafia by exterminating them (killing them all off). As the brothers set out on there quest to kill all mafia members, a detective (Willem Defoe) tries to track them down. As he gets closer and closer to solving the case he realizes he wants them to be doing what they are doing because he feels it is the right thing to do.

Everything Else

It is not very often I really have a lot of fun watching a movie, but with The Boondock Saints that is exactly what happened. I love movies involving the Mafia and crazy shootouts, but to add the style Troy Duffy did to The Boondock Saints just made it that much better. The directing was tremendous with the way parts of the story were zoomed through and then revisited later. There is a lot of Guy Richie feel to this movie in a way (I mean that as a great compliment to Troy Duffy).

The acting was good on all fronts. Willem Defoe does an excellent job and ends up being a little more quirky than his usual performance. The two brothers Sean Patrick Flanery and Norman Reedus were obviously the two main characters and provided a strong base for the rest of the cast to work from. The two looked a lot like they could be brothers I guess, but the way they acted together is what really sold me on their characters.


The script and story written by Troy Duffy truly made this a memorable movie. I loved the idea of the two brothers feeling they had a calling from God to carry out this mission as it provides excitement and controversy which are both key to making a story that will stick out in people’s heads for a long time. I haven’t forgotten this movie because of this and wish Troy Duffy would get out there and make another flick. As far as imdb is concerned, it would appear he is not going to make another one. Wikipedia proved to be more useful in telling the story. Apparently Duffy had marketed the script to and actually got a 15 million dollar budget originally and then it got dropped and he had to push forward to get another deal for less than half the budget. It ended up not getting in many theaters and not playing for long (partially because of the Columbine shootings and the MPAA knocking it s a lot), but it made 6 million on the DVD sales which Duffy did not see a penny of because of the contract he had signed. This is a tragedy in my opinion, but it would seem he is working on a sequel and will have to try and come back to Hollywood for a second chance. I can only hope he makes it even though I am not a fan of sequels.

The Real Deal

I liked this movie a lot and finding out the filmmaker Troy Duffy seems to have gone through such torment to get this out there only to get basically nothing in return makes this a sad story. I am pulling for Duffy on this one as he seems to have a true talent for filmmaking and I would definitely like to see another movie like The Boondock Saints. With all of the language, violence, and sex you should take the R Rating seriously on this one; in fact one of the trivia notes on this movie describes the “f” word being used 246 times (yowza!). This movie is one you should pick up if you have not seen it.

The Short Version

Raw Score: 824,392
Sharon Movie? No

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