Tag: Robert De Niro

Killer Elite

By إبن البيطار (Own work) [GFDL (www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html) or CC-BY-SA-3.0-2.5-2.0-1.0 (www.creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], via Wikimedia CommonsManaged to sneak in a quick film this afternoon as gran popped round. We we ran out of the house, giggling like loons while she had her back turned and left her with the kids.

Killer Elite

“Blood doesn’t bother me. It’s ink I’m worried about.”

Plot-in-a-nutshell: retired hired assassin is dragged back into the world of shooty death to save the life of a colleague

See it if you like: impressive thrillers dressed up as action films with excellent casts, intriguing “based on real events” storylines and brutal fight scenes

I mentioned the cast up there, and impressive it is indeed. Jason Statham at his very best (actually acting, not just being a tough guy), Robert De Niro in as meaty a role as you’ll ever see him in and Clive Owen crossing the good guy/bad guy part impressively. Yvonne Strahovski (from TV’s Chuck) also appears as the eye candy, getting to use her native Australian accent – though it does sound a little Kiwi. Please don’t tell her I said that.

Unusually for a film that is – or must be – pretty much fiction or at the very least hypothesis, it’s based on events described in a book partially regarded as non-fiction: Sir Ranulph Fiennes‘ The Feather Men. Set around the Oman war, it details or alludes to a large amount of British involvement which to this day is classified under the Official Secrets Act. Read the Wikipedia article (linked previously) for more information on the interesting story behind it.

The film runs for around 2 hours and crams a lot into that time. Statham plays Danny, one of a band of mercenaries who gets out of the game after one job too many. He is dragged in some months later by a rich oil sheikh who wants one last job done – the killing of three SAS soldiers, guilty of killing three of his sons. As an extra incentive for doing the job, Danny’s friend and ex-partner Hunter (De Niro) is held hostage.

Danny drafts a couple of old friends and they set out on their mission, eventually coming up against the novel’s titular “Feather Men” and their rogue member Spike (Owen).

There shouldn’t really be any clear good or bad guys in the film, but of course Hollywood won’t allow that so there’s an element of non-ruthlessness in places where you’d expect more from the characters. Aside from that, it’s a fairly brutal and unforgiving film very well filmed and with some excellent fight scenes and set pieces. Best of all, though, is that they’re wrapped in an excellent plot.

With such a strong cast, it’s almost a relief to have s decent story to go along with it. Nothing is too over-the-top, even the gore. It keeps the interest right the way until the end credits.

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Limitless (preview screening)

Courtesy of Cineworld and Momentum Pictures, I managed to blag a free preview ticket to see Limitless this evening. A shame I couldn’t find anyone to join me as I had two tickets!

Limitless

“It’s FDA approved.”

Plot-in-a-nutshell – Down and out author starts taking mind improvement drugs and rockets in popularity… but with consequences.

You know a studio is confident about  film when they offer advance tickets to the buying public, in much the same way that you know a film’s going to stink more than one of my farts if they don’t even have a press screening in time for reviews to get out before the release date. Momentum have every right to be happy with Limitless. It’s very enjoyable indeed.

Bradley Cooper plays Eddie Morra (thankfully Shia LaBeouf had to drop out as he injured himself – a small price to pay to have him replaced), a struggling writer who’s view of deadlines is somewhat lackadaisical. Out wandering the streets one day, he bumps into his ex-wife’s brother (Johnny Whitworth) who used to deal drugs. He’s now on the straight and narrow, and offers Eddie a taster of a new “smart drug” which allows a person to harness every synapse in their brain.

Morra very quickly becomes quite a success with his new discovery, and seeks out more of the drug. However, the bro-in-law wasn’t quite as above-board as he claimed and our hero finds himself in quite a troubling situation… while at the same time riding high in the world of finance.

His boss in the office is played wonderfully by class-act Robert De Niro, while the girlfriend rôle is handled well by the rather pretty Abbie Cornish. Cooper himself is excellent as the alternately smart/snappy then down/knackered central character. The dialogue is quick in places and the story fairly original.

As well as a novel plot, the movie is filmed very well and sequences linking scenes are imaginatively done with some funky special effects that genuinely add to the experience. It’s also got a wonderful dark streak of humour running through it. One scene near the end had the woman next to me chewing her knuckles and very close to covering her eyes!

I can also say that this is the first film I’ve seen in a long time where I was disappointed when the credits rolled. Not because it was pants, but the exact opposite – I’d love to see what happened next. It ends well, but there was scope for the story to continue. It’s very rare for a movie to achieve what Limitless did. Leave the audience wanting more.

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