Now, this is the kind of role I want to see Michael Caine play. Following in the footsteps of Clint Eastwood in Gran Torino, Caine takes up the mantle of the septuagenarian avenger in Harry Brown. This isn’t Caine’s first foray into the revenge film. He famously starred in one of the best revenge movies (and one of my favorite films of all time) in Get Carter.
As Jack Carter, Caine played a suave, yet vicious, gangster searching for his brother’s killer in the seedy underbelly of Newcastle. In Harry Brown, Caine is a former Royal Marine collecting his pension and living in the council estates (the British equivalent of the projects) in South London. It is a very ugly and dehumanizing world that Harry Brown lives in. At least Newcastle had a working class charm to it, the estates of Harry Brown have an ultra-modern brutalism to it. The building he lives in looks almost like a filing cabinet where society’s castoffs are stuffed in and quickly forgotten. The film was shot on location in the Heygate Estate which bares similar architecture to the infamous car park from Get Carter. Just like the car park, the Estate has been torn down to make way for gentrified reconstruction.
Harry Brown opens in a shocking manner with an amateur video recording of two drugged out youths joy riding on their bikes and shooting off a gun. They terrorize a mother pushing a stroller and unintentionally kill her before being struck down by a truck while fleeing the scene. The area is rife with crime and drugs thanks to the local youth gangs.
Brown lives alone in his apartment while his wife lays comatose in the hospital. He is late for her dying moments after taking the long way because the local hoods gather around a more convenient underpass. The last straw comes when Harry’s best friend and drinking buddy, Leonard (David Bradley) is murdered. The investigating detective (Emily Mortimer) has her suspects, but not enough evidence to arrest them. So Harry dusts off his old service pistol, goes for a walk in the middle of a night, and winds up killing a mugger in self-defense. With a new purpose, Harry is dead set on hunting down Leonard’s killers.
In one of the film’s most unsettling scenes, Harry attempts to purchase guns from a drug dealer frighteningly realized by Sean Harris (who played Ian Curtis in 24 Hour Party People). Harry strikes an uneasy deal as homemade pornography plays on the TV and an OD’d girl lays sprawled out on the sofa.
Even though he’s close to 80 years of age, Michael Caine can still make you believe he can kick your ass. And he probably could. He is easily capable of switching from hardassed to heartfelt. Director Daniel Barber (in his feature-length debut) and writer Gary Young (who also penned the DTV actioner The Tournament) have created a very nasty world for Harry Brown.
However, the film has very little to add to the genre. Harry Brown doesn’t have the deeper meaning of Gran Torino. It doesn’t transcend the trappings of its ‘Kill ‘em all and let God sort it out’ philosophy. More sensitive types may bemoan the way the film reinforces the fascistic overtones common with vigilante pictures.
Rating: ** ½
No comments:
Post a Comment