Glengarry Glen Ross is a pleasure to watch just for the excellent performances. It’s about a group of real estate agents given an ultimatum to meet a certain quota or lose their jobs. Alec Baldwin is the boss who deliveries the news like a drill sergeant (he has a similar role in The Departed). Jack Lemmon plays a sad and pathetic salesman (parodied as Gil on “The Simpsons”). Al Pacino is a slick agent who sells Jonathan Pryce property by getting him drunk, who comes in sorrowfully the next day asking to get out of the deal; it’s painful to watch the guy squirm as Pacino tries to save the deal by pretending to be his friend. Ed Harris, Alan Arkin and Kevin Spacey give equally impressive performances. Glengarry Glen Ross is an actor’s movie, and a good one.
The YouTube video shows Alec Baldwin’s entire performance (contains profanity).
Scarface is a silly, over-rated 1980s gangster movie that is so melodramatic and dated, it’s a joke. Cubans who hear Al Pacino’s Cuban accent must laugh the way Newfoundlanders laugh at the accents in The Shipping News. It may be fun to watch as a cheesy, over-the-top, violent, blood and guts B-movie, but an animé cartoon with the same two-dimensional characters would have been just as dramatic.
Donnie Brasco has to be one of the best and most overlooked gangster movies ever made. An entertaining but sympathetic look at the personal lives of criminals and the cops who go after them. Al Pacino doesn’t get any better than this, and Johnny Depp doesn’t miss a beat. Impressive all around, gets better with each viewing.
Glengarry Glen Ross is a pleasure to watch just for the excellent performances. It’s about a group of real estate agents given an ultimatum to meet a certain quota or lose their jobs. Alec Baldwin is the boss who deliveries the news like a drill sergeant (he has a similar role in The Departed). Jack Lemmon plays a sad and pathetic salesman (parodied as Gil on “The Simpsons”). Al Pacino is a slick agent who sells Jonathan Pryce property by getting him drunk, who comes in sorrowfully the next day asking to get out of the deal; it’s painful to watch the guy squirm as Pacino tries to save the deal by pretending to be his friend. Ed Harris, Alan Arkin and Kevin Spacey give equally impressive performances. Glengarry Glen Ross is an actor’s movie, and a good one.
