We’ve all had that experience where we see something awesome; gush about it till the cows come home; tell our friends, tell our neighbours, tell our bank tellers, tell our court appointed therapists and everyone in between. Then there’s the bring down. That cool thing we saw, just isn’t as cool as we think it was when we saw it last. Maybe the light’s changed, maybe we changed, maybe the hype built it up as something more in our heads. Who knows? This was my fear upon seeing Rian Johnson’s The Brothers Bloom again. It was favourite film of last year’s Toronto International Film Festival and it was my top pick overall for 2008. Seeing it a year later on DVD, how could it possibly compare?

On other hand, when it comes to movies, often the second viewing of any film is diminished by the simple fact that this is the second time around, so what’s there to fret about exactly. But in all candour, I loved this movie. It has zip, it had flair, it had style and numerous other things that made it light years ahead of the usual cinematic swill I ingest on a weekly basis. That may be a bit harsh, I admit. So with a bit of doubt, I opened my DVD player and popped in my review copy of The Brothers Bloom, prepared for anything, but still with fire-burning that this was still one of the finest movies I had seen in recent memory.

Coming out the other side, all I can say is that the film stood up, albeit with a few caveats. Something about Rachel Weisz’s character, eccentric heiress Penelope Stamp, kind of bothered me during this go round, it just seemed like she was just trying really, really hard to come across as eccentric rather than just being eccentric. *** Boom Boom, meanwhile, the Brother’s mysterious Japanese munitions expert still made me laugh. Something about Rinko Kikuchi’s strong, silent type just translates without saying a word, and she’s one of the pieces of absurdist humour that makes the film work so well in the first place. It’s the right combination of character and actor; story and action. Despite any particular reservation, once you get into the film, it’s still very sharp.

At the very least, you, or rather those of you amongst the mixed emotion in regard to this film, must appreciate that Brothers Bloom is clearly head and shoulders the best con flick to come out in the last several years. Try as filmmaker’s often might to replicate that certain thing that the great heist movies like The Sting have, it doesn’t always come to pass that they end up any good. Brothers Bloom, however, is the exception. You love the characters, but the heist stuff keeps you on your toes even though the plan (and the puzzle) is carefully laid out before you. Johnson is a consummate talent and between this and Brick is seemingly enamoured with the golden age of cinema in the 30s and 40s. Clearly, this filmmaker is possessed to bring smartly-written crime movies back in style and I’m behind him 100 per cent.

So long story short, yes Virginia, The Brothers Bloom still sits high atop my must-see (or must-see again) movie list. Keeping in mind that some people whose opinion I think a lot of didn’t like it as much as I did, I do note that a lot of those non-glowing reviews weren’t necessarily indicting of any particular badness of the film, but were merely ambiguous about the final product. To me the artistry and the enjoyment is unquestioned. It’s not a strong a film as I think Brick was, but Brothers Bloom is far from a sophomore slump. Whether the original experience was more rewarding for being the first time or for being on the big screen, I cannot say, but this one movie where the second helping was just almost as good as the first.