This week we have in Bucharest screenings of the films that were presented to the Cannes Festival this year and last night I went to see Andrew Dominik‘s movie Killing them softly.

Never heard of Andrew Dominik before and with a good reason since he only directed around 3 movies in all his career. Regarding this movie, I’m still considering whether I liked it or not. The story isn’t something never seen before.  It’s the classical gangster movie. Constant smoking, some heavy drinking, serious drug use, endless foul language, some whoring, a terribly brutal beating, lots of blood. So nothing impressive so far. It’s like watching Goodfellas or Godfather.

What I did enjoy was the really good actors selection (with Brad Pitt looking like a bad guy full of power and Ray Liotta, trying to trick the others to get more money, but eventually gets beaten to death). Also, the soundtrack was excellent and the special effects really succeeded in transferring the actors states of mind.

What I really appreciated was the way Dominik managed to make a reference to politics as well. The action takes place in the 2008 elections time and during the whole movie we see scenes with Obama having speeches about people being equal no matter their religion, sex, race, about America which is not divided in states, but it’s an united nation, one people, one country. And then we have the story of the movie, which shows a different America, with violence and crime. The final line of Brad Pitt’s character, Jackie Cogan  describes best the reality ‘America is not a country. It’s a business.’