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The LimeyRating:
Release Date: 26 February, 2002 Retail Price: $9.98 OUR Price: $8.99 You SAVE: $0.99! Cast: Complete Cast (10 total) |
The Limey Reviews
I loved it , great to see Terence Stamp starring again
This film owes so much to the wonderfully intense performance of Terence Stamp . I don't know why he doesn't get more work . Only now after seeing a film like POINT BLANK do I notice the original influence . This is a revenge film but you cannot wait to see how it happens .
The film has an 'arty non linear' storytelling style , but is easy to follow . The film is set in sunny California , which seems to make things more sinister somehow .
I recommend this film and also another one like it , but set in 70's England called GET CARTER , which stars Michael Caine .
Both DVD's have good special features , which include the lead actors speaking in the commentaries .
For the price , you cannot go wrong .
You may find it hard to believe the same director that made this was behind the remake of OCEAN'S ELEVEN , but it's true .
If you like it , do pick up the POINT BLANK DVD as well .
The push that Soderbergh needed towards greatness
I will not pretend this is not my favorite American film ever, it is. I first saw this in the initial theatrical release in 1999. This is the film that made me change my major from marketing to film, and change my goals in business, and life. Now that's an impact on at least one viewer. :-) This is also the film, that I believe pushed Director Steven Soderbergh over the cusp of greatness. Already with an impressive body of work in "Sex, Lies, and Videotape", "Gray's Anatomy", and the outstanding thriller "Out of Sight", here the director applies the sum of his education, and gives you the the single most innovative revenge/crime thriller in American film.
I will touch on the plot briefly as far better writers than I already have well covered it dozens of times over. Terrance Stamp portrays career con Wilson, a cockney Brit who travels to L.A. upon his release to get answers concerning the suspicious "accidental" death of his estranged daughter. Upon arriving he makes contact with his daughters friend Eduardo, wonderfully portrayed by the usually underutilized Luis Guzman, and, voice/acting coach played by Lesley Ann Warren. After cutting through some henchman types who had recently come in contact with Wilson's child, his path of revenge leads to aging 60's icon, record producer Terry Valentine. Valentine is portrayed by the legendary Peter Fonda, who is at his most animated, and sleazy best as the cowardly Valentine.
Everybody in this film is absolutly terrific which is typical of a Soderbergh cast who seems to just bring the best out of a cast like nobody else. One cast member who gets no notice in any of the reviews I have seen is Melissa George who in haunting flashbacks, and Wilson's imagination portrays his daughter Jenny. I cannot give this young lady enough credit for giving such a revealing face to a character only seen in memory, with no voice, with no dialouge. She is beautiful, meloncholy, and unforgettable and manages without ever speaking to give somekind of voice to the voiceless along with another young actress named Michela Gallo who does duties as the young child of Wilson's memories.
The direction of Sodergergh, and most importantly his cutting of the film alongside editor Sarah Flack is imaginitive, and daring. The cut is as chaotic as the memories of a faded conman, who time passed by so long ago would be, yet the direction of this cut is nothing short of masterful. Much like the era the antagonist/protagonist saw thier heyday in, Soderbergh weaves the surreal, with the very real, advances the story, and studies his "hero" in ways that I had never imagined before seeing "The Limey". This film could not have been made without Stamp, and Soderbergh has said as much before. The icon easily outperformed any and every actor in 1999, and got nothing in the way of nominations for this achievement, which I still think a travesty. This is a film with excellent dialouge, but never relies on dialouge to explain, or advance, or develop. The breadth of Wilson's development in our eyes is done for just that, our eyes. Stamp's face, his eyes, his mouth, his body language tell us all we ever need to know. It seems that everybody looks at this as a crime thriller, but really this is human drama, and character study at it's finest.
I've followed Soderbergh for many years, and this was a really fun step in his progession to the director who will soon be tackling Che Guavera in an epic that I had onced hoped to make. But I won't hold it against him :-)
If you want a great work, that you will watch again, and again....go to the top of the page and order this gem.
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