Noutions Good movie, but best of all time? Hardly . . .

Sameer Callahan It really made me laugh, but for some moments I was tearing up because I could relate so much.

Mandeep Tyson The acting in this movie is really good.

Josephina Great story, amazing characters, superb action, enthralling cinematography. Yes, this is something I am glad I spent money on.

betty dalton This is one of those movies that wants to look tough. And ends up looking like a wannabe. The actors are good but again look like wannabe tough guys. And yes, they fit the model of toughness with their sunglasses, weapons, slapping women and shooting gangsters, but it nags a little. Everything has been done better in other movies that DO look cool and tough. I am fond of heist movies with tough guys. But some humor and a more natural casual style of directing will give a heist movie much more cool and real looking toughness. Pulp Fiction is funny, but you dont dare mess with Harvey Keitel, however ridiculous he may be dressed in that classic. In "City of Industry" everyone is trying so hard to look cool but it is not very believable at times.All in all this is still a reasonably good heist movie with lots of killings and revenge. Lots of action scenes. It didnt bore me. I have watched it two times over the years. Harvey Keitel played great. But sometimes he too became almost a parody of himself. Let's call it a good popcornmovie. 7 out of 10 mainly thanks to Harvey Keitel who saved this film. Could have been much better though if the direction had been more creative. It could have been.. but it just wasnt.

drjgardner There are so many inaccurate references to "film noir" from reviewers that I'm prompted to write this review simply to correct them. Though this film has some "film noir" elements, the essential elements are completely missing. The best film noir features an "innocent" person who gets dragged into crime. Usually it's as a result of a knowingly bad decision, but it comes from the seduction of a femme fatale.Both these elements are missing. The main character (played marvelously by Harvey Keitel) is a lifelong criminal. There's nothing "innocent" about him. Nor is there any femme fatale who double or triple crosses him or who seduces him into the misadventure.The film not only lacks the essential hero (or anti-hero) and femme fatale, it lacks the visual style of most film noir.Finally, the film lacks the requisite ending to ever be classified as film noir.Of course there are some film noir elements. It takes place in an urban center (LA) and dwells in the less upscale parts of town. A lot of the action takes place at night. At the core of the film is a double cross (though it isn't the femme fatale and there are no triple crosses) and we get introduced to a motley crew of seedy low lifes. There's a good bit of violence, but truth be told, most classic film noir are not nearly as violent as this film.It's probably best to view this as a "revenge" film, or more accurately a crime revenge drama.

Robert J. Maxwell Thief Harvey Keitel comes to Southern California to join his younger brother, Timothy Hutton, and a nice Latino (Wade Dominguez) and a driver (Stephen Dorff), to pull off a diamond heist at one of those high-end stores that line the main drag in Palm Springs. They are successful. As they are about to divvy up the loot, Dorff kills Hutton and Dominguez. He tries to kill Keitel too, but botches it, which is what you might call a bad mistake.Dorff takes off with all the loot and the rest of the movie has Keitel tracking him down, at the cost of a lot of money and an infinity of pain. At the end, having dispatched Dorff, the wounded and bleeding Keitel sees to it that Dominguez' widow (Famke Janssen) gets most of the money from the job. Keitel disappears, perhaps dying, and Janssen retires with her two kids to Port Arthur, Texas. End of story.A lot of this is familiar territory by now and has been done better elsewhere -- "Heat", for instance, or "Straight Time." But it's not badly done, despite the rather weak script. It's always interesting to see the underside of L.A. The Chinese sweat shops, the bars where the black guys hang out, everybody in shades, dilapidated single-family homes with their front yards littered with trash and children's toys, Lucy Liu doing a pole dance, San Pedro's cracking plants, dusty and mostly empty motels with propane gas tanks ready to explode at the hint of a stray bullet, careering cars knocking down utility poles and emitting showers of fake sparks, sleazy flowered shirts that scream out "Dollar Store", hotels with dark apartments where you wouldn't want to live unless you like junkies for neighbors.The director handles his background people with effortless aplomb. After he shoots two of his accomplices, Dorff chases Keitel through a louche trailer park, firing wildly. When he loses his quarry, Dorff looks angrily around. When the bullets started flying, the rednecks and their dogs scramble over fences to get out of the way, only to appear at their doorways seconds later. One fat guy in a cowboy hat cocks his shotgun, and another has a pistol at his side. It's amusing. You feel that these guys have been around such situations before. But the director has kept them in long shot and doesn't make a big to-do out of the point. Nice touch.In another scene, Keitel is beating the crap out of the bartender in an empty saloon. Two Latinos walk through the door, take a quick look at what's going on, and back out again.If there's not much new in the revenge plot, the details of life in this particular social world are pretty nicely captured. Well, I must say that the villain of the piece, Dorff, is thoroughly stereotyped. There's nothing "good" about him. He's a young, cocky, ruthless showoff. He plays raunchy music loud in his convertible. He shoots through his own girlfriend's chest in order to plug the guy holding her from behind, and shows not a wit of remorse. The director allows Dorff to commit a fundamental error. As in "Platoon," every time the F word is used, it is shouted emphatically. "And bring the EFFING money!" That's not how the F word is used. If anything is stressed in an utterance, it's the noun, not the adjective. Bonus point: Harvey Keitel has an opportunity to howl with anger and smash some furniture.Not a memorable movie, but one worth watching for diversion.

fertilecelluloid John Irvin's "City of Industry" has the grit and pessimism of another crime classic, "52 Pick-Up". Although it's not as stylish as Frankenheimer's film, it is just as violent and just as radiant (in a sleazy way). Like "52...", there are several splendid performances, not the least being that of Harvey Keitel, a vengeance-seeking career crim, and Stephen Dorff, an incredibly savage villain. Set in parts of LA you'd only want to visit on the screen, this Ken Solarz-scripted underworld drama is constantly engaging and vicious while remembering to be intelligent, too. Timothy Hutton turns in a stellar performance, as does the always-watchable Famke Janssen as a woman recently widowed by the fall-out from Dorff's betrayal of friends. Irvin is not an ostentatious director, so when his source material is weak (as it was in "Raw Deal"), he can't dress it in pretty clothes. But when his material is strong, as it is here, he stands back just far enough to let the story take its rightful turn. This is a seriously underrated classic.