Hidden at the back of a lot of more recent titles, the title 'The Limey' caught my eye. A look at the box told me everything I thought I was going to need to know; a guy kills lots of Americans as vengeance for his daughter's death, the twist to this guy being that he's British. Probably a 6 out of 10 type thing. I was proved very wrong.
What I got is an intelligent, well made, well acted film. I thought Terrance Stamp was perfectly cast as Wilson; I know there's been a lot of people complain that he wasn't a very accurate portrayal of a Londoner. Personally, I didn't think there was anything wrong (compared to the laughable efforts I've seen before, I thought he did very well), but then again, when has anyone ever known an American director to accurately portray a British person? As I say, I thought Soderbergh and Stamp did it very well, but prior to this, everything from The Simpsons to Independance Day has portrayed the British as being royals who live on an island so tiny they must all know each other. So there have been worse.
Frankly, I haven't any idea why the scenes kept flashing back and forward, but whatever the reason was, Soderbergh pulled it off brilliantly. (Only complaint being that it became less apparent as the film went on, had he kept it up, it would have made it more powerful still.) He and Peter Fonda also created a very interesting villain in Terry Valentine. In contrast to Wilson's anti-hero, you can really see how un-stereotypical Valentine was. He got someone else to do his dirty-work, he often needlessly panicked, he didn't seem in the slightest bit vicious, yet you'd want to hit him really hard within seconds of meeting him.
My compliments to Lesley Ann Warren, Luis Guzmán and Barry Newman, they all did their jobs text-book perfectly. The action scenes weren't overdone either. Frankly considering the hype, they could have been a little more brutal, but they didn't come every five minutes as I expected. The brief car-chase bit is great.
9/10 - I expected a knock-about actioner, I got an intelligent well-made film. My congratulations to Mr Soderbergh.
What I got is an intelligent, well made, well acted film. I thought Terrance Stamp was perfectly cast as Wilson; I know there's been a lot of people complain that he wasn't a very accurate portrayal of a Londoner. Personally, I didn't think there was anything wrong (compared to the laughable efforts I've seen before, I thought he did very well), but then again, when has anyone ever known an American director to accurately portray a British person? As I say, I thought Soderbergh and Stamp did it very well, but prior to this, everything from The Simpsons to Independance Day has portrayed the British as being royals who live on an island so tiny they must all know each other. So there have been worse.
Frankly, I haven't any idea why the scenes kept flashing back and forward, but whatever the reason was, Soderbergh pulled it off brilliantly. (Only complaint being that it became less apparent as the film went on, had he kept it up, it would have made it more powerful still.) He and Peter Fonda also created a very interesting villain in Terry Valentine. In contrast to Wilson's anti-hero, you can really see how un-stereotypical Valentine was. He got someone else to do his dirty-work, he often needlessly panicked, he didn't seem in the slightest bit vicious, yet you'd want to hit him really hard within seconds of meeting him.
My compliments to Lesley Ann Warren, Luis Guzmán and Barry Newman, they all did their jobs text-book perfectly. The action scenes weren't overdone either. Frankly considering the hype, they could have been a little more brutal, but they didn't come every five minutes as I expected. The brief car-chase bit is great.
9/10 - I expected a knock-about actioner, I got an intelligent well-made film. My congratulations to Mr Soderbergh.