Stephen Cloud – Through the Shattered Lens

Does this plot sound familiar?

There’s a gang war brewing. An undercover cop is sent into one of the gangs and ends up falling in love. Another cop is involved in the undercover operation but he’s actually working for one of the mob bosses. And then there’s a Russian mob boss who keeps complicating things. The whole thing plays out with a lot of scenes of people pointing guns at each other and randomly shouting before gunfire erupts. No one can trust. There’s plenty of twists. There’s narration from one of the mob bosses. The plot is actually pretty confusing as one person after another turns out to be working for someone else. The whole thing leads to so many betrayals that it almost become comical in its indulgence.

The Departed, you say?

No, this isn’t a Scorsese film. Instead, this is 2012’s Beyond The Trophy, which has a plot that borrows a lot from The Departed. Then again, the film actually borrows a lot from every other mobster film that’s ever been made. Most gangster films aren’t really about the activities of real-life gangsters as much as they’re about recreating the classic film scenes that the director enjoyed while growing up. As a result, we get a few Scorsese-style freeze frames to go along with the narration. We get plenty of Tarantino-style stand-offs. We got the Russian mob because every film has to have the Russian mob nowadays.

We also get Michael Madsen and Eric Roberts. Roberts plays Sgt. Bachman and his role is small. He smiles while barking out orders and he looks after his daughter, another undercover cop named Chastity (Brooke Newton). Roberts doesn’t get to do much and I’m not sure how many big city police departments are run by people with long hair but he’s Eric Roberts. You can’t help but love him. As for Madsen, he narrates in his trademark threatening whisper. Madsen is one of those actors who was born to play tough guys so he’s credible as a mob boss, even if he doesn’t really put much effort into the film. You can usually tell whether or not Madsen is invested in a film by whether or not he bothers to wash his hair. For the most part, his hair look pretty oily in this film.

The majority of the film revolves around Stephen Cloud and Michael Masini as the two cops and they both give credible-enough performances. Because the script is basically just a recreation of scenes from other mob films, neither one really gets a chance to surprise us. The one member of the cast who actually does manage to break free and make an impression is Robert Miano, who makes his Vegas mob boss into a somewhat sympathetic figure.

File this one under standard mafia nonsense.

Previous Eric Roberts Films That We Have Reviewed: