Directed by: Josh Trank
Starring: Tom Hardy, Linda Cardellini, Matt Dillon, Kyle MacLachlan, Noah Fisher
It came as a shock to me to learn Al Capone was merely 48 years old when he died in 1947 following a near lifelong battle with syphilis. He looked a lot older, and in Capone he looks downright ancient. The dude had city miles on him. What we get in Capone is a look at the final year of the gangster's life, when his health was in steady deterioration while living in exile in a garish mansion in Florida. While battling incontinence, confusion, hallucinations, and paranoia, Capone's advisers tell him to sell some of the statues around his property since income has stopped pouring in. If the advisers were even halfway decent at their jobs, they would tell him to sell the obscenely large property and find an apartment.
Tom Hardy plays the title character. His career has been a mixed bag for me, mostly due to his penchant for hamming it up shamelessly and taking on roles which guarantee he would have to dig into his bag of accents. I remember when Tom Hardy used to be a mere actor, now he is this guy who threatens to chew not only the scenery, but the other actors. It takes a special actor not to appear to be afraid of him. In Capone, Hardy is heavily made up and looks appropriately sickly. His health makes it difficult for him to be understood or to raise his voice to the level of audible speech, and that's just the way Hardy likes it.
Hardy isn't the reason why Capone is unsuccessful. The movie itself is pointless. We are asked to witness Capone shit the bed, piss his pants, vomit, and wander off on hallucinatory journeys into his past before he was imprisoned for tax evasion. He claims to his most trusted lieutenant (Dillon) that he hid ten million dollars somewhere for his family to live on after his death, but he can't recall where it is. The feds have bugged his mansion, and use Capone's doctor (MacLachlan) as an infiltrator to pry Capone's secrets loose from his fevered brain. Another very minor intrigue is Capone's illegitimate son Tony, whose existence is not known to Capone's long-suffering wife Mae (Cardellini) and son (Fisher), and who continually attempts to phone his old man to speak to him.
We know Capone was once a big deal because he is still infamous even today, and Capone touches on his homicidal reign of terror as the boss of the Chicago mafia. But now, he is sad, pathetic, and dying. We get to witness it for ourselves. Lucky us. Now, about the whole Dillon character, a mobster named Johnny. He is introduced by receiving a phone call from Mae while he is banging some woman. Johnny answers the phone, exchanges pleasantries, and agrees to head to Florida to visit the ailing Capone. Now, once you learn exactly who or what Johnny is, why was there such a scene introducing him? It makes zero logical sense. Mae may not even know who Johnny is, let alone how to contact him, so this was thrown in simply to throw us off the scent and deliver an a-ha! moment when we discover his true nature.
Capone adds up to very little. Other than seeing Tom Hardy shuffle around and muttering to himself, which I'm sure will delight his fans, what exactly is Capone about? We care as much about a post-gangster Al Capone as we do about a pre-war General Patton.
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