Solemplex To me, this movie is perfection.

Stellead Don't listen to the Hype. It's awful

Juana what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.

Bob This is one of the best movies I’ve seen in a very long time. You have to go and see this on the big screen.

chapmanba-32756 True art, a great film, in league with the best. I disagree with the pretentious criticisms herein written about GUNSHY. The story comes through time and technique to move the theater-goer as only great stories do, starting with Wm Shakespeare's works, down through the dramas of the great British and Russian writers, from Ernest Hemingway and Gabriel Garcia Marquez, through all the other great journalists of the 20th century, and to the few damned fine movies that Spain, France England, Chile, Mexico and the United States have brought to us.With films such as Gunshy, reviewers should rise above what they deem imperfect, to simply evaluate the human impact of a story? Taking a line from Gunshy, which borrowed it from Melville, "Look not too long upon the fire." . . . Read the reviews of real people below the Youtube screen of this film. We are the public, we are the final word in any review.

LeonLouisRicci Some Good Acting Chops are On Display in this B-Movie and the Story is OK but the Thing Lacks Style. It is Remarkable to Add an Intellectual Subplot to the Usual Gangster Clichés like Drugs, Slang, and Swagger. A Gangster Thug who Knows that there is More than just Beatings and Intimidation but hasn't a Clue, is Attracted to a Formerly Successful Writer Suffering the Block and is Hitting the Bottle and Befriends Him for a Cultural Tradeoff.It is All Mediocre and the Dialog is Middle of the Road and the Action is Restrained, but Again there is No Style Awarded to the Characters or the Script. It just sort of Lies there a Good Idea Unfulfilled. The Love Triangle goes No Where and is Contrived and not Thought Out Very Well.Worth a Watch but the Sparks Never Ignite and the Middle Reveal is so Sudden and Unbelievable that the Film Suffers for the Remainder, Never Managing to Recover from that Ill Advised bit of Double-Cross.

elshikh4 Actually the idea of one gangster who wants to be educated by that unemployed writer is quite brilliant. It has one great irony which could make a fine comedy, a good Action or a nice drama about the difference between the 2 worlds of them both. The movie cleverly tried to make a strange romance out of it with some thrill yet with a character's analysis that really says a lot about the personality of the contemporary cultured.I love it all together; the simple direction, the effective acting, the bluesy music. It was all about the fallen world of (Jake Bridges) and how this gifted man just loses it when he confines himself faraway beyond the factual humans & things, to become that isolated literate who cut all the bridges and had nothing to present nor to tell. But now the story to till about (or to report about to be precise !) is the life of that gangster who's shown as more sincere, honest and ethical ! It's that marvelous situation of one conscious brain but inanimate, and one twisted muscle but so active. So of course the world will be for the second man and when that second also searches for goodness, then the love too will be for him ! It's (Casablanca) again ! But with the famous sentimental exile as a modern cultured person who's less idealistic than the gangster ! Therefore the end here was ingenious with (Frankie McGregor/Michael Wincott) and (Melissa/Diane Lane) being together free under the sun - as he deserves her better - and (Jake Bridges/William Petersen) is in jail (metaphorically his own jail of misgivings) writing at last as he finally lived one experience to write about which came from his late interaction with real people, but again he was writing about them from the same idiot perspective : (I miss them. It's strange. The people whom you'd think that you would never love.. are the very ones whom last in your memory !) look at his ever dull point of view (you'd think that you would never love..) he still treats according to previous concept as they're all lower than him and he sadly still denies his love for them (they just in his memory !) even if they're fun to remember and painful to miss !So what's the motif of that (Rick Blaine)'s ugly new copy ? It's the human journey in the big world just to discover oneself ! and the self of that gallant authentic gangster was wanting such a good place in real life, so he won love. And that swindler learned loiterer who wants a book, money or even the same love perhaps will get everything except love. Why is that ?! Maybe because he was loving himself all along, seeing no one anyone except himself ! Or maybe because he is the perfect exile cultured who is meaner and less strong-willed than the ex-criminal. So what a satire this movie presents against (Bridges), and his likes, as the real criminal who's too detained and barren to learn or feel anything true and lasting.

Greg Bulmash William Petersen plays Jake, a down-on-his luck writer who has lost his muse and crawled into a bottle. One night, he drunkenly takes on an obnoxious bar tough, Lew (played by Meat Loaf), who takes him outside and begins to hand him a serious beating. The beating is interrupted by a low-level Irish mob enforcer, Frankie (Wincott), who had an appointment with Lew for a collection. Frankie puts a hurting on Lew and takes Jake home where Frankie's girlfriend, Melissa (Diane Lane), who happens to be a nurse, provides medical attention for Jake.Though Jake is obnoxiously resistant at first, Frankie wants to be his friend and help him out of the hole he's dug himself into. In exchange, Frankie wants Jake to help him become more educated and erudite.While this could turn into a sappy story on the level of Danny DeVito in Renaissance Man, instead it's a cool, dark tale of conflicting loyalties and desires with a little redemption thrown in to boot. Well acted and with solid dialogue, the film has a few cliche moments, but they are ultimately forgivable in the end.