I Declare War takes you into the heart of the city of Detroit where The Sinclair Family, The Demarco Family & the Khalil Family are each vying for control, power, money and the love of their families. Each family has a strong patriarch but being the leader of an organized crime family comes with a very high price. This is war and casualties will be your wife, your children or even yourself.
I Declare War plays like a C-student's final exam essay on Lord of the Flies. Any interest in the game is overridden by the massive amounts of allegory lifted straight from Golding's novel.
Co-directors Jason Lapeyre and Robert Wilson do little more than repeatedly echo the pic's theme after establishing the basic conceit of Lapeyre's script in the opening minutes.
[A] surreal, strangely effective look at childhood imagination.
Los Angeles Times
August 29, 2013
The performances may be slightly uneven across the cast of a dozen distinct personalities (plus a dog), but overall the effect works because, after all, they're just playacting ... right?
