Why it should be written so that the undercover man is a mystery until halfway through the film is actually one of the most intriguing things about the picture. As this is based on a true story, anyone familiar with the events will know immediately, anyone not familiar with the events can easily look it up and find out, and anyone that chooses not to do that will, as stated above, figure it out before the movie makes it explicit anyway.
Kings of South Beach takes place in the mid-‘90s, just as the area of South Beach was beginning to explode in popularity. This made-for works very hard to place itself into this time period, from music, to clothes, to rollerblades. Some of these elements work better than others. For instance, Kings actually shows Andrew Cunanan shooting Gianni Versace. Neither Versace nor Cunanan have any part in the plot of the story whatsoever. They didn’t appear before the shooting, and Cunanan doesn’t appear after. The scene is simply there, and then weakly tied back to the story when an officer asks Troiano about Cunanan, who, the officer claims, visited Troiano’s club, and Versace, who was at Troiano’s the night before getting shot. It’s a weak, silly excuse to further place the movie at a specific moment in time, add a famous name to the mix, and get to show one more murder.
What then is right with the movie? Wahlberg gives a good performance as Burnett, and I’ve always found Jason Gedrick to be charismatic on screen. Additionally, it’s able to generate just enough excitement through car chases, beatings, fights, slightly off-color language, and jiggles to make for a passable evening (the February Sweep is, after all, over).
Kings of South Beach premieres on A&E Monday, March 12, at 9PM.
Article comments
1 - WSCK.
Where can I get the soundtrack or some of the songs?