NekoHomey Purely Joyful Movie!

Hadrina The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

Kimball Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

Staci Frederick Blistering performances.

bpatrick-8 It's not one of the prettiest events in American history by any means. But somehow I always have fun watching this movie, even though Robards' over-the-top portrayal of Capone (and he seems to relish every moment on camera) and the presence of some actors I usually associate with sitcoms (Harold J. Stone, Milton Frome, Mickey Deems, Mary Grace Canfield) make it difficult to take completely seriously. Only a few actors--Ralph Meeker, Clint Ritchie, Joe Campanella--do seem to take themselves seriously, and none of the gangsters portrayed in the movie would frighten me if they were really these actors. However, it is a riveting portrayal of the gangland rivalries in Prohibiton-era Chicago and the lengths to which these gangs would go to get control of another gang's territory. As for Paul Frees' narration, I welcome it, since I've only become familiar with the various members of the Capone and Moran gangs through his mini-biographies as he introduces them (I do think the "at 7:22 on the last morning of his life" bit is a little overdone). One final thought: I agree that George Segal is also over-the-top, playing what appears to be a pretty boy trying to be tough (watch him with the bartender early in the picture). Anyway, I try to catch this movie anytime it's on; even though I know how it's going to end I still get a kick out of watching the not-very-scary performances.

lord woodburry Although Jason Robards doesn't look very Italian, he exudes The Big Feller's flamboyancy throughout this documentary styled movie about the infamous prohibition era massacre on February 14, 1929 at the Clark Street Garage in Chicago. The film brings the viewer through the history of Capone's bloody rivalry with the North side Irish German gang, the foiled attempts of the North Side Gang to take out Capone and Capone's bloody reprisals eliminating each successive Northside leader until the Northside's crown fell to Bugsy Moran (Ralph Meeker).Ralph Meeker plays the part of the Northside leader as a foil to Jason Robard's mercurial Capone. In the film version, both Capone and Moran have excellent heads for business, leadership and strategy but Meeker as Moran assumes an aura of polished reserve and distance.As the movie opens Capone hat in hand requests Mafia approval of a hit on Moran.But on this occasion the Northside has the jump on Capone. The Mafia Don is executed. However Moran's expectation that the assassination will cause an ascension of Joe Aiello (Alex D'Arcy) a Mafioso more friendly to Moran proves to be unrealistic. Capone brutally kills Joe Aiello in reprisal.The stage is now set for the biggest assassination in US history as Capone uses imported Mafia hoods to dress up like cops and machine gun down Moran's entire mob. Mafia spies misidentified a Moran lookalike as Moran; Moran escaped the trap.Reporter: Y'know some are sayin' that it really was the cops who shot those men.Bugs Moran: You must be new to this town, mister. Only Al Capone kills like that.Only Frank Gusenberg (David Canary) lived to die in hospital. There he was interrogated by the stereotypical "good guy cop" of the 1960s, Russ Conway who had played The Hardy Boy's father, a serial that went along with The Micky Mouse Club. Interrogator: (to Frank Gusenberg in hospital) I've got to level with you Frank, you're not going to make it. Want me to call a preacher? Frank Gusenberg: Go Away.It was a nice touch of comic relief at the end of a gruesome story, although succeeding generations unfamiliar with the Mickey Mouse Club will not understand.Comparable films include Ben Gazzara in Capone and Tony Curtis in Lepke. I don't think the film is quite in the same genre as THE GOODFATHER I & II, which I much admire. This is a historical biopic; Godfather is all too real fiction.

toolkien ....just a little too much "you dirty rat" milieu to it. The characterization is too comic bookish. All in all it's just outdated for being from 1967. Jason Robards and George Segal are both very fine actors and they were largely annoying with overacting. It takes some very poor direction to get such performances out of two such good actors. Roger Corman, of course, is known for his B movie legacy and this IS a cut above some of his other works, but certainly not enough to make it very good. The story? I don't want to spoil the ending in case some people don't know it. Is it terrible? No. But it's not good, there's better ways to spend a couple hours on a movie you haven't seen. There's plenty of other movies out there and it is likely you'll find one better than this.

The_Void For me, the great Roger Corman will always be best remembered for his film versions of classic Edgar Allen Poe stories; but he also made a lot of films outside of the horror genre and clearly stories of true American crime interested him as aside from this film he also directed Bloody Mama based on Ma Barker. The Saint Valentine's Day Massacre has a fairly strong cult following and I went into this film with some fairly high hopes because of that; although unfortunately I have to say that I'm not as big a fan as many as while this is undoubtedly an interesting and well made crime film; it also has several flaws. The plot focuses on the Prohibition era and in particular the rivalry between two prominent gangs, one of which lead by the infamous Al Capone. As the title suggests; the main focus of the film is on the famous 'Saint Valentines Day Massacre' which saw a group of men gunned down in cold blood. The film focuses on the main players in both the gangs and focuses on the events up to and including the incident.As anyone who knows anything about Roger Corman would expect; the film does not benefit from a big budget and in some ways feels like a cheaper version of several big budget crime flicks. However, in spite of this, Corman still manages to give his film a good style and the film really does feel like its taking place in the late 1920's. The plot does not play out like a regular crime film and instead we get a fragmented report on the key events and it almost feels like it could be a documentary with reconstructions. Corman was obviously keen to focus on the history too as there's a voice-over that fills the audience in on key happenings. In my opinion, the film would have been better as a straight drama as the way it has been done means that it's interesting in parts and then not interesting in others and there's not a great deal of fluency which is a shame. The film has a sense of inevitability to it all the way through as it's always clear how it will end and while it contains no surprises; The St Valentines Day Massacre is at least a successful retelling of the famous event of it's title.