Brooklyn Rules (2007)

Overall rating from 1 to 100: 71

O Masterpiece (95-100)
O Excellent (75-94)
X Good video rental (60-74)
O Merely OK (50-59)
O Pure mediocrity (30-49)
O Medusa: don't watch (1-29)

Review by Jason Pyles / August 4, 2007

I must confess to having an unconditional love for mafia movies. Now that I have that out of the way ... “Brooklyn Rules” is more of a drama about three friends than it is a mobster story. But I’ll take what I can get.

Alec Baldwin makes a great mob boss, no question about it; but Freddie Prinze Jr. is another story. Apparently, he’s trying to change his image to be more edgy. The last thing I saw him in was “Down to You” (2000), with Julia Stiles. That was a movie for young, teenage girls. (Can’t tell ya why I saw it.)

The actor has done many things since 2000. But now I see him in “Brooklyn Rules,” and he talks like a truck driver’s grandma when “it’s Miller time.” I was quite alarmed. (Imagine your 1st-grade teacher saying bad words.) It just doesn’t seem right.

Three boys grow up together in Brooklyn. Mike (Freddie Prinze Jr.), Bobby (Jerry Ferrara) and Carmine (Scott Caan) are basically good kids, but they’ve come up in a rough neighborhood and are, therefore, rough around the edges themselves. As young men, they even happened onto a guy that the mob whacked down by the river. The three have seen a lot.

Mike decides to go to college to try to rise up out of his background. Bobby has already found his true love. He only wants to get married and work for the post office. Scott, on the other hand, is impressed with the power of the mobsters, much like Henry Hill in “Goodfellas” (1990). He decides to join their ranks. Naturally, Scott’s other two friends are nervous about his dealings with a crime lord like the infamous Caesar Manganaro (Alec Baldwin). But Scott’s connection tends to have its pluses and minuses.

The movie follows the three friends as they try to stay together while being pulled in different directions. I like the friendship between the trio, which is the point of the movie. But I get the sense that “Brooklyn Rules” is supposed to be about the mafia encroaching upon their camaraderie. It’s much like watching “Jaws” (1975): When the mafia comes around, that’s when Jaws visits — we have fun. When the shark swims away, we sink into our seats again, a little bored.

This isn’t a Scorsese picture, but it begins to approach that status. “Brooklyn Rules” has a certain authenticity to it that makes us wish it were a little more “Hollywood-ized” or “Scorsese-ized.” After all, those of us who like mafia movies only watch them to see who’s gonna “sleep with the fishes.”

Directed by Michael Corrente
Alec Baldwin / Freddie Prinze Jr. / Scott Caan
99 min. Drama / Crime
MPAA: R (for violence, pervasive language and some sexual content)

Copyright 2007.
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