| Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM) | Release Date: April 18, 1986 | CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION | ||
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Positive:
9
Mixed:
4
Negative:
2
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Critic Reviews
Wise Guys is an abundant movie, filled with ideas and gags and great characters. It never runs dry. It never has the desperation of so many gangster comedies, which seem to be marching over the same tired ground. This movie was made with joy, and you can feel it in the sense of all the actors working at the top of their form.
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De Palma's takeoff on the Godfather genre doesn't have the subversive slyness of Prizzi's Honor. Wise Guys aims lower, but that's an honorable direction in which to aim, and De Palma and writer George Gallo riddle the belly with dumdum laugh bullets. [19 May 1986, p.73]
Though Wise Guys isn't a big movie, its gentle parody of gangster mythology, which adopts the pace and tone of a European caper movie from its opening titles, makes Prizzi's Honor seem naive by contrast. [13 May 1986, p.B6]
Wise Guys is never more than a nice time, but it's never less than that either, and because the timing of the jokes is so bang-on, it makes you wish De Palma would get away from the blood bag more often. [23 Apr 1986, p.C5]
There is plenty of dumb stuff in Wise Guys, a rambunctious comedy about two screwballs on the loose, probably more than anyone should stand for. But the doughty will stick around for its small pleasures, most of which spring from the lens of Brian De Palma. [10 May 1986, p.C4]
The directing, by Brian De palma, is canny and smooth, but this musty genre calls for fresh jokes and sharp, colorful personalities, and that's not what he's working with.
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