SpuffyWeb Sadly Over-hyped

Listonixio Fresh and Exciting

CommentsXp Best movie ever!

Tymon Sutton The acting is good, and the firecracker script has some excellent ideas.

Armand it is realistic and for Eastern public, full of memories. because it is not only a Russian story. it is the story of a period. pictures from transition to democracy, images about solutions after Communism, fight for power, success and fall. if it is a Russian slice from victory of a new generation, in same measure it is a beautiful film. action, love, friendship and old emotion of East. politic, crime and poetry. and interesting acting, smart script - not a surprise for the director of Ostrov. it is a special film for its flavor of atmosphere. common at first sigh, it represents a form of testimony and reflection of a dark reality who makes deep difference between East and West Europe.

rlange-3 The acting was good to excellent, and the overall plot themes were clear. This group of friends leaps into post-Soviet Russia and makes a fortune by bending the rules such that there are rules, and playing the political side of the economic game. In the course of doing this, they run afoul of a government that is equally corrupt. This is a setting that a well made film might turn into a masterpiece.Unfortunately it doesn't happen. There are so many throwbacks and forward scenes that one would need to watch the movie with pen and paper in hand, tracing the characters and their actions to try and keep track of the specifics. The movie tries to help out by actually labeling each scene with a timeline, before and after the death of Plato, the central character. But even with these guideposts, the back and forth movement of time requires extraordinary effort to translate into meaningful flows and never develops a satisfying momentum. It is akin to reading a history in which a few paragraphs of Alexander are followed by a series on Hiroshima and then by a brief exposition on the founding of Rome, followed by a vignette on the Crusades.No doubt some will see this approach as a puzzle challenge. Personally I thought it interfered with both the entertainment value of Tycoon, and the capacity of the movie to sustain intensity of interest. The end result is a crippled performance in which one is tempted to throw up their hands and say, "Ah, they are all just crooks, let's see some action". If that was the intent, the movie does provide some gratification, but it could have been so much more.

snake77 "Tycoon" may not succeed as a political film or piece of social criticism, but I don't think it was meant be those things. "Tycoon" was obviously meant to be first and foremost an interesting, entertaining crime drama, and on this count I think it succeeds marvelously. It has timeless themes: loyalty, betrayal, greed, envy, power, love, lust. To me the fact that it is based on the 1990's Russian oligarchs is almost secondary. It's more like a good war movie - the time and place is really just a setting, a backdrop used to tell a good story. The script is beautifully structured, the actors all give terrific performances, the direction is understated and confident. Unexpected things happen, scenes jump back and forth through time, and the pacing is excellent. Even though it's got the "a gangster's life" story arc (similar to The Godfather, Casino and the hugely overrated Scarface) in which the risks are taken, trusts made and broken, beautiful women seduced, liquor poured, bullets sprayed, etc., from scene to scene you aren't quite sure exactly who will do what. It holds your interest from beginning to end. No doubt there is a great documentary to be made about the rise and fall of the actual oligarchs or "New Russians", one which could tie together with great detail the entire true story. But "Tycoon" isn't that film, and I think it's arguable that it's better because if it.

George Parker Telling of the rise and fall of an upwardly mobile wannabe tycoon who just sort of magically makes a fortune by parlaying brooms into jeans into cars, etc. by climbing the ladder of success in the new Russia's corrupt market economy of the past 20 years, "Tycoon: A New Russian" has low production value, a story which asks more questions than it answers, a confusing herky-jerky flow which leaps back and forth through time, poor character development, etc., and, of course, subtitles. Given so many liabilities, it would be difficult to recommend this flick to anyone save those few with a real interest in Russian cinema. Russian film enthusiasts should check out the much better Russian film: "Utomlyonnye solntsem (Burnt by the Sun)" (1994). (C)