Hit: A Mobumentary Film Movie Review

Director Blake Calhoun turns his video camera and his substantive sense of irony to a pair of the most overworked genres in film today: the mobster movie and the mockumentary.

In Hit, Calhoun traces the work and play of the Pascadelli family, a once great crime family that now encompasses four people (not related, even) and has faded into irrelevance. Calhoun uses this as his thesis: That today's mob is pathetically neutered, resorting to putting out phony return bins at Blockbuster to steal videos, hosting playground craps games, and a foray into "eStortion" -- extortion by email. The gags work as often as they flop, making Hit par for the course.

For what it's worth, the production is above average for indie-on-video material. The acting is good, though none of these actors look like career criminals (that's kind of the point, but if thick-neck Pesci types had been cast, the effect would have been much more humorous). The ending also has a surprise in store for us, guaranteed to get one last chuckle out of you, capping off a film that's just as amusing as it oughtta be.