The  Criminal

At last, a British movie that dares to be different. In doing so, it mines some rather old-fashioned territory, the likes of which British cinema has not seen in quite some time, that of the film noir. America of course still visits this genre fairly regularly, most notably courtesy of David Mamet who can make them in his sleep. The Spanish Prisoner is just one fine example of how to do film noir correctly. With The Criminal, Julian Simpson makes a nice attempt but in the process of creating the required serpentine plot, his movie stutters to a halt. One night, unemployed musician, Jasper Rollins meets a woman in a bar. She's well-spoken, beautiful, sexy and he's aware that she is well out of his league but he continues in a rather vain attempt to get some "action". Surprisingly, she agrees to go back to his flat with him, what's more she seems perfectly amenable to a night of hot sex. Someone suddenly bangs on Jasper's door. Thinking it's an annoying neighbour, he answers it, instead he gets knocked out. The mystery caller kills the woman, framing Jasper, who is then forced to go on the run, with a whole horde of cops as well as a vicious assassin on his tail. The Criminal is a movie that opens with such great potential. It sets up its central premise easily and plants the essential everyman at the core of an intriguing, suitably labyrinthine mystery. The necessary ingredients for successful film noir are here and accounted for: aggressive disbelieving cops, a femme fatale, shadowy dangerous businessmen, a thoroughly bewildered innocent who simply wants to escape with his life intact. Everything is present but after a promising opening half, the movie disintegrates into a convoluted mess of dumb twists and tedious exposition. Throughout are peppered some enjoyable action sequences that do seem somewhat out-of-place given the film’s British setting, but they prove the rare highlight especially as the movie progresses. Laziness eventually overwhelms the entire production as the ending peters out with a highly guessable “twist” villain and an uninspired arc of downbeat violence. In the lead, Stephen MacKintosh provides a perfectly believable and likeable performance as the audience’s entry-point into the sordid twists and turns of The Criminal’s underworld. As the two cops on his case, Bernard Hill and Holly Aird both give suitably gritty turns, the former at times rather annoying in his brusque, expletive-ridden role. One of the more eye-opening casting coups is the appearance of comic Eddie Izzard playing a character devoid of any camp quality. For once playing absolutely straight, he is surprisingly convincing as a forensic scientist who may not be all he appears. At the end of the day, I just can't shake the feeling that The Criminal would have been better off as a TV movie, the kind that BBC 1 might air around 10pm. It just does not feel like a movie made for the bigscreen. There are some nice performances and the production values are fairly decent but like Sorted and Maybe Baby, I get the feeling that the cinemas are pushing the home product a little TOO hard.