Up to the point when I saw MAD DOG AND GLORY, I had only seen 4 John McNaughton-movies. WILD THINGS and NORMAL LIFE were two very decent crime/drama/thriller-movies which I both liked a lot. The ones which I probably enjoyed the most were the dark & obscure HENRY: PORTRAIT OF A SERIAL KILLER and the fun horrorfest THE BORROWER. The last two, however, suffered a bit from lack of decent pacing, probably caused by a screenplay ignoring the conventional rules of writing. This clearly being symptoms of McNaughton's earlier work, MAD DOG AND GLORY also suffers a bit from it. But I will most certainly not hold it against him because it helps create that off-beat feeling you can find in his earlier work. That being said, there is absolutely nothing wrong with MAD DOG AND GLORY, except for one little disappointment (I'll come to that later).

The story is interesting and, considering the cast, sounds very promising. Robert De Niro plays Wayne'Mad Dog'Dobie, a rather timid cop/crime-photographer who isn't to keen on pulling his gun. One day, when walking into a nightshop he saves the life of gangster/stand-up comedian Frank Milo (Bill Murray). As a thank-you-gift Frank offers Glory (Uma Thurman) to Wayne. She can be his girlfriend for one week. As one might predict, the two will fall in love before the week is over.

Technically, you could describe this movie as a romantic comedy (with a touch of crime & drama). And though it's not my favorite genre, I can only appreciate a man like McNaughton giving a shot at it. And he pulls it off well, but not without giving it that touch of his. For instance, the opening-scene is very violent for this type of film, the sex-scene rather explicit (Uma Thurman goes surprisingly nude in that scene) and the dialogues are NOT too sugary or buttery. So, extra points for ignoring the romantic comedy-clichés as well as for casting De Niro and Murray against type.

The acting is, as you can expect, very good, but unfortunately real fireworks between the actors never happen (that's the little disappointment I mentioned). Nevertheless, it's always fun seeing De Niro and Murray do their thing and they certainly do have their moments in this movie. Especially Murray (just watch the introduction of his character). The ending is not your clearly defined 'happy-end' and the final confrontation between De Niro and Murray is different then you'd expect and over before you know it. That may not sound so good, but believe me, it works (as a result of the off-beat pacing of the screenplay). David Caruso's performance is also 'très naturel' and he seems comfortable as De Niro's helping friend. Caruso's fight with Mike Starr is one of the highlights of the movie.

So, in the end we have a well-acted enjoyable comedy/drama with touches of the sweet and the violent. Whether you like it or not, you can not ignore the fact that it dares to be different on some levels. For me it's clear: I'm off to see the other John McNaughton-movies I haven't seen yet.