The Way Of The Gun (2000)

I came across The Way Of The Gun after watching The Usual Suspects for a third time and was curious as to who had written the screenplay. It was by Christopher McQuarrie for whom it won an Oscar at the 68th Academy Awards in 1996.

Four years later The Way Of The Gun hit the screens and is the first film McQuarrie directed, from his own script. It shares with The Usual Suspects a twisty – and very entertaining – narrative line and was made on a comparative shoestring budget of $9.5 million ($17.75 in 2026).

It took in almost double that figure at the box office when it appeared but, we’re told by those who like to tell these things, ‘it received mixed reviews’. To some that might suggest the film is not quite up to scratch, but I take issue with that suggestion. McQuarrie might then have been a rookie director but what the rookie produced was better put together and more interesting than the work of many an experienced director.

First off, though, let’s talk ‘the money’, a topic always dear to a Tinseltown producer’s heart and the sole reason most of them, if not all, get up every morning. Many a producer would give her or his eye teeth to rake in almost twice as much as their film cost to make.

That’s a point worth making because The Way Of The Gun did that where many films made at several times the cost do not. We rarely hear about the bummers though, as few folk are fond of loudly announcing their failures.

Well, upfront, let me reassure you: despite a flaw here or there, The Way Of The Gun can stand proud and is certainly better than many much-lauded but tripe films.

Obviously, these judgments and claims are subjective, and to force home the point I must concede that one 

man’s ‘tripe’ is another man’s ‘it’s really, really, really brill, man, I mean amazing, really, really amazing’.

Like the recommendation for a restaurant that ‘the portions are really big’ which in my book conveys ‘not all that great, to be honest’, pretty much every film I’ve seen that others have described as ‘amazing’ has been mediocre to bad boilerplate crap, with ‘excitement’, ‘thrills’, ‘the set-up, ‘dialogue’ and ‘characterisation’ that is clichéd well beyond that call of duty.

I admit, though, that’s what rather a lot of folk demand and that they feel cheated if they don’t get the usual blockbuster fare.

There’s a solid market for cliché, and Hollywood knows it and is always happy to supply it, because if the punters don’t get a noisy two hours plus of Tom Cruise doing his Tom Cruise bit (and implicitly celebrating ‘American grit’), all to a very loud and stirring score, there’s trouble.

Admittedly such films make money, loads of it, but so does a Park Lane or Upper East Side whore. And you’ll get little romance from said whore, and at the end of the day you are nothing more than just another john with a fat wallet. She knows it and sadly, in your heart so do you.

But, as I say, whatever turns you on – ‘amazing’ blockbusters have long done nothing for me and I no longer bother watching them. My snootiness might mean I risk missing a gem, but why sit through bog-standard unoriginal bollocks, only to realise that if there is a gem, that bloody clunker you’ve just seen wasn’t it?

. . .

Critics of The Way Of The Gun say its pacing is a little ‘off’ and even McQuarrie concedes his film is ‘uneven’. As in The Usual Suspects, the narrative line takes us all over the place and some critics suggest that your average viewer will have lost interest before the final ‘reveal’. Well, maybe your average viewer should stick to the latest CGI techno-fest that has as much character and personality as a stale white bun.

Surely, like much else, ‘pacing’ is in the eye of the beholder, and ‘pacing’ is important in whatever field you are working. A few months ago, I watched Sergio Leone’s ‘celebrated’ film Once Upon A Time In The West, and if any film ‘got its pacing wrong’, that one did.

Some of Leones scenes last far too long in, I suspect, in an attempt to ‘increase tension’. To go beyond a point, it’s not tension you are creating, but a growing and hostile impatience. It is Leone’s trademark tic and when he first used it, it was original. Used again and again and then again, it degenerates into tired cliché. You really don’t want the punter, metaphorically, to be looking at a watch and wondering which bus he should catch later. But it happens.

There’s none of that in McQuarrie’s film, however. But as far as pacing is concerned, a director’s editor, in this case one Stephen Semel – never heard of him, but why would I? – also has some responsibility.

A good editor, whether of film or music or film can make or break a work. He or she – Scorsese almost always worked with Thelma Schoonmaker – is often crucial, though much will depend on the dynamic between the director and his or her editor and, perhaps, the relevant producer if the bod like to weigh it.

What I found especially admirable about McQuarrie’s first film is that for a ‘budget’ production which had few resources, there are no obvious signs it was filmed on a comparative shoestring. And sadly, in the hands of lesser first-time directors these are often easy to spot. And that is down to the director using her or his talent.

I read that McQuarrie was curious as to why Ryan Phillippe, one of the petty criminals against whom fate works because of wheels with wheels, had lobbied to appear in the film. In 2000, Phillippe was 36, but still big news in Tinseltown after a stint in a popular soap when he was younger and then in several very successful films and who could expect a great and lucrative future.

Why, McQuarrie, asked him, are you willing to be paid peanuts to be in my film?

Well, Phillippe is reported to have told him, Hollywood wanted to make him into a huge film star, but he didn’t want to be a film star, he wanted to be an actor. That’s why.

I get that and cheer Phillipe along. He turns in a great performance, as does the always dependable Benicio del Toro who first came to movie prominence in The Usual Suspects.

I also read that McQuarried was modest and wise enough to accept notes from his actors, for example that one conversation as simply too wordy and would be more effective it it were tighter. He took that advice.

In brief, as far as I can see as always when I either recommend a film or diss it, this comes down to – forgive the downmarket tone – horses for courses, you can do a lot worse than give The Way Of The Gun a whirl. There are two extended gunfights, but to stress those would be to misrepresent the film.

sIt is far more and far better than than that, with good performances all-round, not least from old-stager James Caan as a long-in-the-tooth but till more than savvy gangster.