Running Scared

—1. Overview
—2. Cast and Crew
—3. Photo Pages
—4. Trailers, Clips, DVDs, Books, Soundtrack
—5. Posters (Paul Walker)
—6. Production Notes (pdf)
—7. Spiritual Connections
—8. Presentation Downloads

From the very beginning, we are drawn into a frighteningly violent story where the dangers of bringing your work home with you are much scarier than the average extra paperwork. Running Scared’s frenetic cinematography sucks the audience into a seamy, sordid world of mob violence and police corruption. Through the eyes of two boys, best friends Nicky and Oleg, we watch the downward spiral of Joey Gazelle, smalltime mobster, as he tries to keep his occupation and his family separate. With that said, I’m going to blow the ‘surprise’ ending in the next sentence, so read on at your own risk!

Joey is a cop deep undercover and what we can later realize how deep Joey has gone in losing himself. To get in with local mobsters, Joey has done some terrible things—and in the process, it appears that his worldview deteriorated too. He doesn’t appear overly kind toward his wife Theresa or his son Nicky, and certainly treats with the Russian Oleg and his family with disdain. I’ll imagine young, idealistic Joey the new police officer as idealistic and moral—he’s lost some of that in twelve years undercover.

Now, faced with threats against Theresa, Joey first seeks out the gun in an act of self-preservation and rises to self-sacrificial status. His sacrifices toward the end doesn’t provide any dramatic ‘aha’ moment because it’s overshadowed by the actions of Theresa and Oleg. Theresa’s execution of the pedophile couple shocks us out of the typical macho violence by providing some justice at the hands of Theresa.

The true ‘moment’ of the movie occurs after Theresa kills the pedophiles and challenges Joey to be something, more than just marginally (rather pathetically) bad. Now that she has faced down true evil like she has never seen, Theresa wants him to rise from his mediocre badness and be good for once. A great opportunity for change—Joey takes it—and the recognition of Theresa that even little ‘sin’ can’t be ignored, means that two lives are changed in this instant. This moment unlocks the good that has been buried and he takes over—with a bit of help from his little Russian buddy, Oleg.

Having defended his mother, and later, a prostitute, with his new-found handgun, Oleg must later stand ‘as a man,’ and defend Joey. While quite a few people look away when pain threatens someone else, Oleg never does. He gets John Wayne better than his father and comes to understand the better meaning of what it takes to be an “American cowboy.� American cowboys stand together, show a willingness to sacrifice it all, and rise to the occasion when they’re called to it.

While the violence of Running Scared sickened me in the same way that A History of Violence did, there was a redemptive theme to this that History lacked. Family really did stand together and could overlook the sins of the father—and the father was the most appreciative for that forgiveness! Searching for one thing (a gun), Joey found something different (another son), and his life is forever changed. I guess the saying is true, if you don’t stand for something, you’ll fall for anything.

— Overview