Already Boston-based feature filmmaking seems in a rut -- take a tough
blue-collar neighborhood, a conflicted hero, and some wiseguys, add a few
variations, and you've got Next Stop, Wonderland, The North End,
Southie, and now Ted Demme's Monument Ave. For its variation this
one boasts Denis Leary as a Charlestown car thief whose complacent, larcenous
lifestyle crumbles when friends and relatives get whacked for perceived
violations of the local code of silence. Should he buck tradition and be a
snitch (one of the film's previous titles), turning in ruthless mob chieftain
Colm Meaney to world-weary police inspector Martin Sheen? Should he just count
his money and keep quiet? Take justice into his own hands?
As those questions stumble toward their predictable resolutions, most of the
film's best moments remain inconsequential -- Leary and his pals on coke and
booze discussing popular movies, or cruising the streets in a cab and alighting
on an African-American who wandered into town by mistake. The latter scene is
jarring, if gratuitous, demonstrating the kind of edge and energy this
pedestrian effort otherwise lacks.
--Peter Keough
Capsule Reviews
Monument Ave. 
Monument Ave. 
Other Films by Ted Demme
Beautiful Girls 
Life 
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