Writer/Director Guy Ritchie's latest release, Snatch, is a non-stop, off-beat comedy/crime drama. Something like Go, or Get Shorty, (and, I'm told, like Ritchie's Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels), Snatch opens with a group of men dressed as Jewish Rabbi's robbing diamonds from a non-descript Jewish bank or firm. One of the crooks, Franky Four Fingers (Benicio Del Toro) is sent to England to sell a portion of the diamonds before heading to America to unload the prize of the heist--an 86 carat diamond.
Four Fingers is soon set up and kidnapped by a group of bumbling, British thieves: Tyrone (Ade), Sol (Lennie James), and Vinny (Robbie Gee). Needless to say, Del Toro never makes it to America, and is actually killed quite early in the film. The diamond winds up in the hands of Russian criminal, Boris the Blade (Rade Serbedzija), but he doesn't hang on to it for long. The man who Del Toro was going to meet in America, Cousin Avi (played wonderfully by Dennis Farina), learns that the diamond is missing and heads to England to retrieve it. He does eventually, but doesn't keep it for long. Are you seeing a pattern?
The basic premise of Snatch is that everyone is snatching the diamond from one another. Ironically, the main character, Turkish (Jason Stathan), an illegal boxing promoter who narates most of the narrative, doesn't even know about the diamond until very late in the film. He and his partner, Tommy (Stephen Graham), are much more worried about beig fed to the pigs by big-time gangster and king of the illegal boxing world, Brick Top (Alan Ford).
Snatch takes place entirely in England, and offers a number of great performances. Every character seems to have some hang-up or quirk, and they are all portrayed well. Even the more minor characters,Vinnie Jones' (Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels and Gone in 60 Seconds) and Bullet Tooth Tony, are standouts. One of the best performances in the movie is given by Brad Pitt, as the tattoo-covered Mickey O'Neil. O'Neil is a pogney Irish gypsy who lives in a movable trailer park with his people. Along with being extremely hard to understand--even by the Brittish characters--he also happens to be a bare-knuckle boxing champion. He is dragged into this complicated tale of Illegal boxing/diamond thievery and manages to do very well for himself. I wouldn't go so far as to say that he steals the show, but you will certainly remember him more than many of the main characters whom you see much more.
The cinematogrophy of the film is excellent and Ritchie also seems adept at choosing locations. The real standout in this movie is the dialogue between the charcters. Much in the same vein as Quentin Tarantino's and Elmore Leonard's style of writing, Snatch delivers this type of casual speech with unmistakablly dry British wit--and it works. One of the most memorable scenes in the movie is Brick Top explaining to Tyrone and Sol the intracacies of feeding humans to pigs. Apparently, there's a science to it.
Snatch may not be the movie of the year, but it is a clever, humorous crime narrative and it's definitely worth your time and money. If I haven't made myself clear--go check it out.
