HOT: Road to Perdition

I bought this film when it came out on DVD, which I am guessing was in 2002, and watched it not long after. I had not watched it again. On my first viewing it just didn't grab me like most Tom Hanks films have - and so it sat in my collection unwatched until now.

After a second watch, I think I like Road to Perdition a little more than on my first watch. Hanks stars as Michael Sullivan, who works for a crime lord named John Rooney (Paul Newman) - in what would pretty much be his last film before he died not as a voice actor.

Sullivan and his family, wife Annie (Jennifer Jason Leigh) and sons Michael Jr. (Tyler Hoechlin) and Peter (Liam Aiken) have a pretty decent life living in the protection of Rooney and the money that is coming in. But, as many have found out, if you cross the Rooney family it may be the last thing you ever do.

Not quite understanding what his father does for a living, and really not having the greatest relationship with his father, Michael Jr. hides in the back of a truck one night when his father and Connor Rooney (Daniel Craig), who is Rooney's son - which I am guessing may be the first time I had seen him in anything - go to talk some sense into an associate when all goes wrong and they are forced to murder him and his associates. The whole event witnessed by Michael Jr.

Sullivan promises both Connor and John that his son would never speak a word of what he saw - but Connor remains unstable and sends Sullivan on a job in order to get him killed - while going to their house to murder the rest of the family.

I have to admit, not really sure I didn't enjoy this the first time around. I really got into it much more this time. The old-time era looked great and some of the characters in the film were just great - including one I didn't mention Harlen Maguire played brilliantly by Jude Law.

Still, I can't rank this too high on the Hanks list of films, but I think it has earned the right to be in a rotation of rewatches whereas before I wouldn't have given it another look.

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