Gangster Squad (2013) 8/10

Starring : Josh Brolin, Ryan Gosling, Sean Penn, Nick Nolte, Emma Stone, Anthony Mackie, Giovanni Ribisi, Robert Patrick, Michael Pena, Mirielle Enos
Director : Ruben Fleischer
Running Time : 113 mins

It’s 1949, and with the city of Los Angeles firmly under the control of mob boss Mickey Cohen (Penn), Sergeant John O’Mara (Brolin) decides to form a group of cops who will work outside the law to try and take down the crime kingpin and finally return their city back to the people, but the best laid plans of all involved don’t always go as smoothly as they hoped.

This is a fun-filled, action packed movie that, in spite of its comical title, is to be taken too seriously. It manages to pack itself full of everything you could want from a gangster flick, from romance to bromance, from gun play to fist fights, this basically has everything you could want in a crime caper, aside from an element of realism about how Cohen manages to get away with everything but then gets arrested for what amounts to having a fight with a cop (granted there are some dead bodies milling around the place, but he managed to get away with those sort of shenanigans previously).

You’ll like this if you liked : L A Confidential