Playing Cool

Ultimately Snatch emits the embarrassing aura of a filmmaker desperate to be cool, yet utterly inept at finding original ways to reach that status. Even this year's trifling Circus offered more bangers than this mash. Also, while the Tarantino parallel quickly grows stale, that guy simply writes and directs better than Ritchie, somehow coaxing out charming laughs ("I like the way you stink") while Ritchie struggles to maintain our attention with dick jokes that would bore a five-year-old monkey. (Most of the dialogue -- like "I fookin' 'ate pikeys!" -- is amusing only for its cockney delivery.) Yes, it's simply more of the trendy same from Ritchie, and whether we should appreciate his gunplay as an improvement over disco balls, hot rods and mechanical bulls is open to debate. As his Bullet Tooth Tony sagely puts it, "You should never underestimate the predictability of stupidity."