An average movie

Well, after 3 really solid directing efforts, it seems that Ben Affleck unfortunately managed to slightly ruin his impressive track-record as a director. Sure, the whole thing was watchable and it looked really good but it still never really worked, I'm afraid. The first mistake he made was to cast himself as the lead. I mean, it did work with 'The Town' and 'Argo' but, in this movie, it felt like a big egotrip to have the guy directing himself as a very clever and sometimes even almighty gangster. Anyway, even with another actor, I'm still not sure if I would have really cared about this movie though. Indeed, eventually , the biggest problem was the story was nothing really interesting or entertaining, maybe it was too long or too slow but, within the first 5 minutes, I was already losing my interest in the damned thing. Basically,  it seems that Ben Affleck made the same mistake that George Clooney made with 'Leatherheads'. Indeed, back then, Clooney was also an upcoming director, his 2 previous movies were some critical hits but, for some reason,  for his 3rd directing effort, he went for a period piece taking place in the mid-20's with himself playing the lead as well but it turned out to be a flop. In both cases, these 2 directors thought that the audience were interested by such tales but they were wrong. Anyway, to conclude, I hope this failure won't damage too much Affleck's directing career and I hope the guy will rebound with his next project, otherwise, I'm afraid he won't be taken seriously anymore as a director for much longer.

6/10