I suppose I can see how so many people could've been hoodwinked into thinking this was a good movie. It just piles a bunch of "cool" imagery and ideas together and flings them onto the screen. "Boondock Saints" is one of the more shallow bits of cinema to cross my path in a while. The twins are fantastic shots when hanging upside down from twisted rope while spinning and wearing ski masks. But line them up in front of one man in broad daylight and they're lucky to escape with their lives. Speaking of shallow cool and that particular gunfight... It looks cool when a man opens his overcoat to reveal a vest with 6 holsters, each containing a badass looking handgun in slow-motion. So while he's constantly running out of bullets and, lightning-quick, whipping out a new gun, the twins have their divine guns that never need to be reloaded. That's one of the main problems with this movie, it can't decide if it's going to be one of those "reload during a gunfight" flicks or a "just keep shooting and never run out of bullets" flicks. Just when you think the movie's going to laugh at itself ("THERE WAS A FIREFIGHT!!!!!!!), it actually shows you that it doesn't get its own joke.
As far as the murky morality goes, it wants to come across as leaving the judgement as to whether the twins are right or wrong to the viewer. But the camera and the script love these Irish rogues a little too much. Lingering on their nakedness, their wicked grins, and their righteousness a little too long.
Willem Dafoe is a great actor and he does his best with the unfortunate script. But behind every great actor is a great director and Dafoe's performance makes me think Duffy was never there to reign in Dafoe's fantastic imagination and energy.
Finally, I can understand the need for Rocco's character; the twins need a spaz around so they look even cooler by comparison. But did the actor have to suck SO MUCH?