Woodyanders
Down on his luck comic book artist Walter Levitte (an excellent and convincing performance by Mike Leszczynski) decides to assume the guise of his superhero character Crimson and declares war on the local Irish mob after he suffers severe nerve damage in the wake of a brutal beating.Director Ken Cosentino, who also co-wrote the hard-hitting script with Michael Shimmel, does an ace job of maintaining a tough gritty tone throughout, keeps the gripping story moving along at a brisk pace, grounds the premise in a plausibly bleak everyday small town world, stages the rough'n'tumble fights with flair, and further spices things up with an amusing sense of dark humor. Moreover, it's acted with gusto by an enthusiastic cast, with especially praiseworthy contributions from James Ventry as vicious raving psycho Tommy, Lizzy Bruno as Walter's feisty sister Amanda, Patrick Gus Posey as ruthless mob boss Boyd Emerson, Adah Hagen as Walter's fed-up girlfriend Brook, and John Lynch as no-nonsense Special Agent Dominguez.Better still, the filmmakers present Walter as a scary and unstable person who's as much a threat to himself as he is to the criminals he goes after, thereby adding a welcome and refreshing ambiguity to the film that makes the valid point that vigilantism tends to cause more problems than it solves, plus deserve extra points for keeping cheesy one-liners and showboating out of the fights. The sharp and lively cinematography by Gary Marino and Chris Mattice provides a real kinetic buzz. The realistic downbeat ending packs a devastating punch. Well worth a watch.
