Damn…  Damn.  Much more arresting than a discussion of exploding genres.  When a film kicks you in the gut.

Filmmakers study the different reactions which can be elicited through the medium of cinema.

They study their own reactions.  They observe the reactions of those around them.

They build up an arsenal of techniques.

And if the filmmaker hits it just right the effect is devastating.

Director Geoffrey S. Fletcher did just that in this unlikely masterpiece.

From the outset it appears that we are in for a hackneyed Tarantino-aping ride, but it gets better.  Much, much better!

The genre is superviolence.  Pulp Fiction and Reservoir Dogs were merely updates on the Kubrick treatment of A Clockwork Orange.

But the auteur Fletcher explodes the genre (to borrow a metaphor from James Monaco) and makes it do things previously unknown.

The superviolence genre can’t handle the intellect injected into its flippant form in Violet & Daisy (and thus a new genre is born).  The genre evolves.

Saoirse Ronan is magnificent as always, but she has great backup provided by her partner Alexis Bledel.  Yet, the real star of this miracle film is James Gandolfini.

There is no way of knowing what plot-twisting brilliance is afoot when you sit down to view this flick.

The surprise of this film (for me) also hinged on just how good Bledel was in the role of Violet.  Bledel and Ronan have unbelievable chemistry in this strange tightrope of a film.

I am stunned by how good this film was…

One last note:  Gandolfini’s performance here is so convincing that it seems impossible this was anything other than his last film.  What a masterful turn!

See this and be enlighteningly shocked.

-PD