This fact-based melodrama is set in Cleveland during the 1970s, when the city witnessed a war between the Italian Mafia and an Irish street gang headed by Danny Greene, whose targeting for murder explains the title of Jonathan Hensleigh's modest but entertaining film. Ray Stevenson plays Greene, whose rise and fall is chronicled by childhood-pal-turned-cop Joe Manditski (Val Kilmer). After a brief prologue sketching Greene's rough boyhood, Kill the Irishman moves forward to Greene's stint as a dock worker and subsequent takeover of the union. Arrested for racketeering—involving an arrangement to pilfer cargoes with Mafia boss John Nardi (Vincent D'Onofrio)—Greene agrees to turn informant in return for his release, but instead links up with his old confederates and becomes an enforcer for numbers boss Shondor Birns (Christopher Walken). Greene has higher ambitions, however, and joins Cleveland's genteel kingpin, Jack Licavoli (Tony Lo Bianco) in schemes involving the garbage-hauling trade. Unfortunately, things go awry, and soon Greene is at odds with Birns and locked in a factional struggle leading to a spate of bombings and shootings, which ultimately draws even the New York Mafia into the spiral of violence. Small-scaled and sometimes confusing, Kill the Irishman nevertheless evokes a strong sense of time and place, while the fine cast creates a rogues' gallery of colorful characters. Recommended. [Note: DVD/Blu-ray extras include Tommy Reid's 2009 biographical documentary “Danny Greene: The Rise and Fall of the Irishman” (60 min.), and trailers. Bottom line: a solid extras package for a decent gangster flick.] (F. Swietek)
Kill the Irishman
Anchor Bay, 106 min., R, DVD: $29.99, Blu-ray: $34.99, June 14 Volume 26, Issue 4
Kill the Irishman
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