REVIEW: Dragged Across Concrete (2019)

What to expect: Another notch on Zalher’s belt.

When I saw the trailer , that shot of the bag filled with gold brought me back to Leone’s masterpiece The Good The Bad and the Ugly, in the cemetary. And to me there is a similarity, this movie is a three ways battle for the money and sometimes uneasy alliances occur, Sentenza would be the group of merciless and weird masked men, Blondie would be the pair composed by Henry and Biscuit who are not as reckless, and Tuco is the pair Ridgeman/Lurasetti, they don’t play by the book sometimes but their motives are noble and their backstories are touching.

There are no real good guys here according to Hollywood moral, this and the 147 minutes , plus the absence of politically correctness will work as an effective repellent against most mainstream moviegoers.

Zahler said it himself, he doesn’t give a shit if you like his movies, he just hopes that you enjoy them.

It’s a slow burn, neo noir, character and dialogue driven movie, building tension with surgical precision, and also trolling the audience with unexpected brutal moments, or unexpected brutal one liners, so it keeps you on your toes despite being slow, but never boring.

Dialogues are clearly the work of a novelist so that could put some viewers off at some point, but a lot of elements make up for it, like the right delivery and acting skills (especially from the chain smoking old school cop Gibson and also from Kittles, but the acting is quite good from everybody) ,the use of static cameras, the practical FX and practical blood.No shaky cam,his trademark so far.

The photography by Bakshi (Bone Tomahawk, Brawl in cell block 99) is great ,the contrast and the use of shadows and lights fit totally to the bleak and cold urban setting and the movie themes.Interestingly all songs are composed by Zahler, and they are played by radios in the movie, so the characters hear them as we do.All these elements totally reinforce the realism and involve the viewer in the story, and as usual Zahler unfolds the story during the wonderful last 40 minutes, which is a new chess game and where most of the action is packed.

We really need more men like Zahler who unearth that gritty exploitation flicks vibe from the 70’s.  Or get rid of this PC plague which ruined most movies since 15 years.  Because when you watch this movie by yourself, you can tell that its a neutral movie, not a propaganda movie, but i guess in 2019, being neutral is being wrong.

Cant wait for The Brigands Of Rattlecreek.

• Frenchie