The Gentlemen

[peter]

Guy Ritchie's latest offering is a return to roots cockney classic, that while perhaps not as toung in cheek as Lock, Stock and Snatch has that same rapid-fire style and streetwise hipness that his fans will love.
Taking us deep into the underbelly of London's drug culture and criminal turf wars, we focus on the activities of cannabis cultivator extraordinaire Micky Pearson, who, attempting to sell his business, suddenly finds himself having to see his carefully crafted operation crumbling around him as the other major players in the arena suddenly sense weakness and opportunity in his decision to exit the game.

Built around a conversation between Pearson's chief luitenant Ray and a gloriously camp private investigator played by Hugh Grant (who we suspect is absolutely loving the role) we get strong performances from the central figures as portrayed by Mathew McConauhay and Charlie Hunnam with a great turn by Colin Farrell as an apparently simple mixed martial arts trainer who is clearly more than he on first glance appears. All in all the film cracks along at a rollicking pace and great fun is had by all.

Switching between seedy council flats inhabited by heroin addicted scumbags and great country piles full of down on their luck toffs, this is fertile territory for Ritchie's style of filmmaking and he goes to town on it. If you liked the two previous films I referred to then you're going to lap this up - if you didn't then it's probably not for you.......but it is sufficiently different that it might still be able to surprise you.

[Avatar]

I enjoyed it quite a lot. Maybe not as fast paced as the other two, but definitely worth being mentioned in the same breath.

(If you like these, you might wanna check out Barry Sonnenfeld's very under-rated 1995 Get Shorty with Gene Hackman, Rene Russo, Danny DeVito, John Travolta.)

--A

[Rigel]

Quite enjoyable.