Running With The Devil

This is a true ensemble cast in a film with various moving parts. We follow both sides of the law, with numerous characters on each.  Writer/director Jason Cabell is a former Navy Seal and based much of Running With The Devil on true events. That lends a lot of realism to the story, and you feel that throughout.

This film is like if Sicario had been made by Quentin Tarantino, but leaner, more efficient. There is less character minutia, but here, that isn’t a bad thing.  While Tarantino creates these long scenes of dialog that give his characters a lot of backstory, that isn’t the point here. With elements of docudrama indictment, thriller, and Tarantino-esque violence, this is about showing the commerce of moving drugs into the states and all the people that process touches.

As we follow the drugs on their journey, and it is THEIR journey, to be sure, their value increases as each leg of their trip passes, and we see how expendable their human entanglements can be.  In whatever way they meet their end, little fuss is made of each, underlining the fact that taking lives means little to those involved in the chain – especially to those characters like The Boss and The Executioner (Cole Hauser). 

“It’s swiftly paced – no time to get bored – and the cast is solid.”

Running With The Devil doesn’t let you get too attached to anybody, and that would normally be a problem; Those looking for a ‘hero’ or someone to root for will be disappointed.  But the real takeaway is that the complex yet simple (Rube Goldberg, anyone?) system by which these drugs are transported is very much a part of the global economy regardless of whether anyone wants to admit it or not. 

Cabell handles all of this rather deftly, providing high-level production, cast (obviously), and editing, even though the latter is a bit jump cut-heavy early on. But Running With The Devil surprised me.  I enjoyed it more than I thought I might.  It’s swiftly paced – no time to get bored – and the cast is solid.  Nothing – and no one – is over-the-top. In fact, everyone is playing it cool.  You often expect a bonkers Nic Cage, but here he is playing more world-weary. Interestingly, Laurence Fishburne plays the addicted, hedonistic sort that Cage usually plays.  And together, they fit just right. I forgot that they worked together on Rumblefish in 1983, and The Cotton Club in 1984. And Adam Goldberg is always great. I suspect his character, The Snitch, was as fun to play as it was to watch.

This film kept me guessing and wanting to know what was going to happen next. It definitely shines a light on how intertwined drug trafficking is to so many economies. With a talented, seasoned cast, and the capable directing hands of Jason Cabell, Running With The Devil is a dark, suspenseful, and fascinating look at a subject often debated. Definitely worth a look.