The Boondock Saints

Troy Duffy wrote the script while working as a bartender. A major studio bought it then pulled out before shooting, so the film was made with independent money on a reduced budget. It is set in Boston but was shot mainly in Toronto in the summer of 1998, with only the closing scenes in Boston. The production was filmed and became the 2003 documentary Overnight. The real formal decision is the ordering. We see the shootouts by their aftermath first, then Willem Dafoe’s FBI agent Paul Smecker talks himself through the scene on site and the same moment plays again, now complete. The pattern repeats through the film. The twins get almost no interior life. They are played by Sean Patrick Flanery and Norman Reedus, little known then, and most of the energy goes to Smecker’s scenes. The release was harsh: distribution was cut back after the 1999 Columbine attack, the film opened on five screens in January 2000 and took $30,471. The cult audience gathered later, on video. A good fit if you do not mind action built aftermath first and cause second, and can take a film resting on Smecker’s monologues. Not for anyone who wants what the brothers do to be argued about inside the film; the narrative stages them instead of questioning them.