Gun Shy
USA 2000
Reviewed by Rob White
Synopsis
Our synopses give away the plot in full, including surprise twists.
DEA Agent Charlie's nerves are on edge following a violent drugs bust. In New York he enters group therapy to help him through his next case, undercover on a Mafia money-laundering scam. Small-time crook Fulvio has set up the deal; Colombian drug baron Fidel is financing it; Jason is the crooked dealer executing it. Charlie starts seeing Judy, a nurse who gives him an enema. Fulvio is mocked by his wife and her father, Don Carmine. The deal begins to unravel when Fidel is insulted by Jason's suggestion that they launder the money by buying Soya beans. Charlie tries to accelerate the bust but his boss Dexter refuses to jump the gun.
After the eventual success of the first laundering deal an even bigger scam is proposed by Jason who's secretly in cahoots with corrupt Dexter. Another DEA agent finds out about this but Dexter kills him before he can tell Charlie. Everybody plans to double-cross each other; the various plotters are about to have a violent showdown in a dockside factory, but Charlie's group-therapy partners prevent this by bursting in, dressed in fake FBI uniforms, brandishing toy guns. Fulvio gets away to Italy; Fidel swims off with his bodyguard lover; Jason and Dexter are arrested by the real FBI; Charlie, Judy and his friends from therapy sail off in a tugboat.
Review
"I'm very sensitive to this Colombian coke-dealer stereotype," says the Colombian coke dealer Fidel in debut director Eric Blakeney's Gun Shy. Later Fulvio, his small-time mafioso partner in a money-laundering scheme adds, "I'm sick of being a cliché." Fulvio is trying to impress his sceptical father-in-law Don Carmine by setting up the deal, but what he really wants is to cultivate the soil in Italy. His wife mocks him when he can't grow tomatoes, and as she walks off he looks desolately at his lone, sickly fruit and sprays it with fertiliser, thinking no doubt - as we do - of The Godfather's Don Vito Corleone's altogether more impressive agricultural skills and the gardening implement Corleone's grandson sprays him with before he realises he's dead.
Gun Shy makes light comedy out of the premise that modern-day gangsters have all seen The Godfather and Miami Vice. As such it seems to resemble television's The Sopranos. But whereas The Sopranos brilliantly used the comedy of this premise as a way of reinvigorating gangster mythology, Gun Shy simply embellishes it for the sake of mild fun.
Liam Neeson stars as Charlie, a veteran DEA agent traumatised by a bungled drugs bust. In order to make it through his next assignment - working undercover on the deal Fidel and Fulvio are putting together - he enters group therapy with several frustrated corporate executives. (Another nod to The Sopranos, as well as to Analyze This.) It seems like Charlie's participation in therapy will derail the sessions since his traumas are so disproportionate to his fellow patients' (who are bothered by lack of promotion and office politics). In fact the men easily find common ground and therapy just becomes a convenient if unlikely pretext for them to bond, a neat device which keeps the plot moving. In an even more unlikely scenario, but one that's in keeping with the light comedic tone, Charlie starts going out with Judy (played by Sandra Bullock) the nurse who, having just given him an enema, decides the root of his troubles is his inability to enjoy the small things in life. Bullock produced Gun Shy and her wholesome persona pervades the film. Harmless jokes about flatulence abound, the plot makes reasonable screwball sense and the protagonists who aren't truly vicious end the film with their desires fulfilled: Fulvio gets his garden, Fidel abandons his family for his one-testicled bodyguard lover, Charlie and Judy sail into the sunset on board a tugboat.
Occasionally harsher notes creep in as if reminding us of reality. A young DEA agent who's been shadowing Charlie is found murdered in his car and another is killed before he can warn Charlie about a double-cross. But these are less moments of serious discordance than slight misjudgements by Blakeney (whose writing credits include episodes of television series Cagney and Lacey and Moonlighting): likewise the odd flashback sequences in which drug dealers being gunned down are seen by Charlie as ballet dancers spinning in mid air.
Credits
- Director
- Eric Blakeney
- Producer
- Sandra Bullock
- Screenplay
- Eric Blakeney
- Director of Photography
- Tom Richmond
- Editor
- Pamela Martin
- Production Designer
- Maher Ahmad
- Music
- Rolfe Kent
- ©Buena Vista Pictures Distribution
- Production Companies
- Hollywood Pictures presents a Fortis Films production
- Co-producer
- Marc S. Fischer
- Production Supervisor
- NY Crew:
- Andrea Isaacs
- Production Co-ordinators
- Cindy Hochman Price
- NY Crew:
- Dori Golod
- Unit Production Manager
- Garrett Grant
- Location Managers
- Eric Hedayat
- NY Crew:
- Dana Robin
- Post-production Supervisor
- Lisa Rodgers
- 2nd Unit Director
- Raymond Prado
- Assistant Directors
- James B. Rogers
- Molly M. Mayeux
- Gregory Guzik
- NY Crew:
- Terry Ham
- NY Crew 2nd Unit:
- John Gallagher
- Script Supervisor
- Jacqueline R. Clay
- Casting
- Laurel Smith
- Camera Operators
- Jeff Mart
- Robert Bennett
- NY Crew:
- Wayne Paull
- Steadicam Operators
- Jeff Mart
- Kirk R. Gardner
- NY Crew:
- Jamie Silverstein
- Visual Effects
- Dream Quest Images
- Special Effects
- Co-ordinator:
- Ron Trost
- Foreman:
- Chris Nelson
- Art Directors
- Seth Reed
- NY Crew:
- Stephen Alesch
- Set Designer
- Domenic Silvestri
- Set Decorators
- Maurin Scarlata
- NY Crew:
- Harriett S. Zucker
- Melanie Baker
- Costume Designers
- Mary Claire Hannan
- Additional:
- Joel Voorhies
- Costume Supervisor
- Leslie Eve Herman
- Wardrobe Supervisor
- NY Crew:
- Donna Maloney
- Make-up
- Supervising Artist:
- Pamela S. Westmore
- Key Artist:
- Cindy Williams
- Artist:
- Melanie Hughes
- Key Hairstylists:
- Jasen Joseph Sica
- NY Crew:
- Nick Troiano
- Hairstylists
- D.J. Plumb
- Kim Santantonio
- Main Title Design
- Goodspot L.L.C.
- Main Title Opticals
- Custom Film Effects
- Opticals
- Pacific Title/Mirage
- Additional Music
- Rick Ziegler
- Conductor
- Bill Stromberg
- Concert Master
- Bruce Dukov
- Orchestrations
- Tony Blondal
- Additional Orchestrations
- Kerry Wikstrom
- Music Supervisors
- Emily Kaye
- Alex Patsavas
- Additional:
- Steve Schnur
- Executive in Charge of Music for Buena Vista Motion Pictures Group
- Kathy Nelson
- Executive Album Producer
- Sandra Bullock
- Music Editor
- Nick South
- Score Recordist/Mixer
- John Vigran
- Soundtrack
- "Blue Skies for Everyone", "Round & Round" - Bob Schneider; "Drunk Is Better Than Dead" - The Push Stars; "Voulez vous" - Arling & Cameron; "Start the Commotion" - The Wiseguys; "I'm Your Boogie Man" - K.C. & the Sunshine Band; "More Than Rain" - World Party; "It's a Man's, Man's, Man's World" - James Brown; "Tarantula" - The Scabs; "Staysha Brown" - The Scabs; "This Time" - Los Lobos; "More Than Rain" - Tom Waits; "Morrocan Home Show Part 1", "Morrocan Home Show Part 2", "Prepare" - Rhys Fulber; "Bossa for Jackie" - Fantastic Plastic Machine; "Honolulu Calcutta" - Fantastic Plastic Machine; "Caro mio Ben" - Helga Bullock; "Under the Sun" - Big Kenny; "No Time to Dream"
- Choreography
- Juan Llano
- Karen Russell
- Sound Mixers
- Geoffrey Patterson
- NY Crew:
- Frank Stettner
- Engineers
- Bob Weitz
- Mark Fleming
- Re-recording Mixers
- David E. Fluhr
- Adam Jenkins
- Re-recordists
- Samuel F. Kaufman
- Larry Spotts
- Supervising Sound Editor
- Dave Hankins
- Dialogue Editors
- Lawrence Goeb
- David Beadle
- Sonya Henry
- Jane Boegel
- Sound Effects Editors
- Andrew Ellerd
- Michael Babcock
- Bruce Tanis
- ADR
- Mixer:
- Dean Drabin
- Editor:
- Helen Luttrell
- Foley
- Artists:
- Alicia Irwin
- Dawn Fintor
- Mixer:
- David Betancourt
- Editor:
- Bob Newlan
- Technical Adviser
- Brian Mass
- Stunt Co-ordinators
- Doc Duhame
- NY:
- Mike Russo
- Helicopter Pilot
- Albert Cerullo
- Cast
- Liam Neeson
- Charlie
- Oliver Platt
- Fulvio Nesstra
- José Zuñiga
- Fidel Vaillar
- Michael DeLorenzo
- Estuvio Clavo
- Andy Lauer
- Jason Cane
- Richard Schiff
- Elliott
- Paul Ben-Victor
- Howard
- Gregg Daniel
- Jonathan
- Ben Weber
- Mark
- Sandra Bullock
- Judy Tipp
- Mary McCormack
- Gloria Nesstra
- Michael Mantell
- Dr Eric Bleckner
- Mitch Pileggi
- Dexter Helvenshaw
- Louis Giambalvo
- Lonny Ward
- Rick Peters
- Bennett
- Dusty Kay
- Kapstein
- Jerry Stahl
- Lucien
- Michael Weatherly
- Dave Juniper
- Hank Stratton
- Josh
- Frank Vincent
- Carmine Minnetti
- Frankie Ray
- Joey
- Taylor Negron
- Cheemo Partelle
- Joe Maruzzo
- Warren Ganza
- Aaron Lustig
- Fulvio's neighbour
- Tracy Zahoryin
- Jason's girlfriend
- Michelle Joyner
- Elliott's wife
- Manny Perry
- Cheemo's bodyguard
- David Carpenter
- SEC Agent Cohler
- Tommy Morgan Jr
- SEC Agent Harris
- Roy Buffington
- FBI Agent Clemmens
- Myndy Crist
- Myrna
- Ramona Case
- first class stewardess
- Derek Sitter
- waiter at night club
- Ron Reaves
- manager at bistro
- Tracy Phillips
- Natalie Webb
- Jennifer Garrett
- Lisette Boren
- Edgar Godineaux
- Dante Henderson
- dancers at Cheemo's house
- Certificate
- 15
- Distributor
- Redbus Film Distribution
- 9.092 feet
- 101 minutes 2 seconds
- Dolby Digital/DTS/SDDS
- In Colour
- Prints by
- Technicolor