Jennifer Coolidge, Bill Murray in the crime comedy

The first question that arises in connection with Dito Montiel’s dark crime comedy about a chaotic family reunion, Riff Raffis how the hell he was able to assemble such a cast of proven talent. Even if they never really gel together as an ensemble, it's a pleasure to watch a duel between Ed Harris and Bill Murray, Pete Davidson as a depressed gangster, Gabrielle Union bringing class to the place, and Jennifer Coolidge leading the way as a sloppy drunk with a mouth like a trucker and a raging libido.

Had all of these qualities been put into a film with a certain tone and a script that built believable relationships, the result might have been a sick joke. Instead, the film vacillates awkwardly between creeping mob menace and rowdy sitcom, slowly building to a violent climax that nonetheless fails to hold together. Montiel, best known for his 2006 autobiographical debut film, A Guide to Identifying Your Saintshas rarely shown its gentlest side, and this bloody version of the “home-for-the-holidays” reunion does not break that pattern.

Reading Montiel's magnificent directorial statement, you get the idea that he could be a great advertiser. He compares reading John Pollono's script to stumbling upon an undiscovered Mamet play, and then offers a series of inspirational references that will make your head spin – Goodfellas, No country for old men, Reservoir Dogs, Blue Velvet And A history of violenceIt's good to set high goals.

He also refers to The White Lotus and… Virginia Woolf? It's unclear whether he means the English modernist writer who committed suicide or the caustic marital drama by Edward Albee, the title of which is a pun based on Woolf's name. Since the author is mentioned in connection with Coolidge, I suspect the latter, and of course there is a vaguely Martha-like quality to her character Ruth.

But if you can see more than the palest imitation of the idiosyncratic films that flood Montiel's vision board, then you have sharper eyes than I do. Maybe everything sounded more convincing during the casting process.

“It's amazing what families do for each other,” says DJ (a likable Miles J. Harvey), the innocent observer who provides voiceover commentary. This crucial statement ties the film directly to Montiel's interests dating back to his debut, namely the volatile dynamics of broken families affected by crime. But the new film seems constantly at odds with itself about whether to commit to the thriller or the comedy side, and ends up half-baked in both.

At the beginning, the good-natured DJ nervously points a gun at Vincent (Harris), the man who has been a loving stepfather to him since marrying his mother, Sandy (Union). “Family can be complicated. Things go wrong,” DJ says, as Montiel rewinds to the beginning to see what brought them to this tense moment.

DJ, who is about to head off to Dartmouth, is a science geek whose thoughtful nature can be seen in the “highly detailed topographical map” he has designed for visitors to the family's remote vacation home in Maine, where the action takes place from Christmas to New Year's. This map will later be a major plot point when it falls into the wrong hands.

Vincent is not at all pleased when his troubled son Rocco (Lewis Pullman) turns up unannounced with his heavily pregnant Italian girlfriend Marina (Emanuela Postacchini) – the only believable relationship in the film thanks to the chemistry between the two actors. The news that he is about to become a grandfather does not help to improve Vincent's mood.

He is even more angry when they pull his unconscious ex-wife Ruth out of the car and drop her like a sack of potatoes on the couch. As soon as she wakes up, Ruth starts drinking, hitting on Vincent, and pocketing Sandy's expensive cosmetics.

Montiel cleverly weaves flashbacks to tell some story. From DJ's amusing earlier encounter with Ruth, we learn that she's been sour and mean for some time, probably since the marriage ended. We're there when Sandy introduces Vincent to her wealthy parents, who remain civilized but frown upon their daughter's marriage beneath them. We learn the touching story of how Rocco and Marina came together. And most importantly, we see Rocco forced to protect his family, which puts him on the hit list of the cold-blooded career criminal Lefty (Murray).

From his interactions with a folksy old general store owner, it's clear that Lefty means business. Vincent has known him long enough to know that it's only a matter of time before he and his sidekick Lonnie (Davidson) show up at their door and the bodies pile up with bullet holes. Murray's dry manner is put to good use when Lonnie argues that two lively neighbors in Vincent and his family's ancestral home don't need to be sidelined: “I'd call these a must,” Lefty replies.

Pollono wrote David Gordon Green's underrated drama Strongerin which Jake Gyllenhaal played a real-life survivor of the Boston Marathon bombing. He also directed a film adaptation of his well-oiled play set in a graffiti shop. Repair of small enginesa vehicle for Jon Bernthal on stage and screen that worked better in its original form.

He can write crisp dialogues, even if his sense of characters and context is not exactly optimal. Riff Raff is a boring film with a completely muddled tone and a strong cast that is largely left helpless. Neither the criminal element nor the stuffy respectability Vincent has gained through Sandy are really convincing.

Even before any blood is shed, one wonders how Sandy, who is not meeting Vincent's seedy ex-family for the first time, could never have suspected that there might be something darker in her “contractor” husband's past. But that would rob the film of an emotional edge in the violent climax, making the already muddled tone even more muddled.