Dirty Pretty Things

"Dirty Pretty Things," a film directed by Stephen Frears is not quite a thriller, romance or a drama, but it does manage to fit all three successfully.

An illegal immigrant in London (Chiwetel Ejiofor), working a day job as a cab driver and a hotel clerk in the Baltic Hotel at nights, discovers a human heart stuck in the bottom of a hotel room toilet one night and worries about what goes on behind the closed doors of his hotel. In the meantime, he develops a friendship with an immigrant woman from Turkey (Audrey Tatou ) who is also just trying to get by first as a maid in the hotel, then, as a seamstress in a sweatshop.

Acting by everybody, especially by two leads is wonderful. I am so glad to see Tatou in the part very different from her Amelie. The story is gripping; and we see London the way we have not seen it before and did not even know that London exists.

An engrossing human drama, stylish noir, social commentary, lives of immigrants, characters study - with the characters deep, human, and very real. No cheap pulling the strings, no manipulation. As a result -one of the best films of the last year.

And that ending.... Fans of "Lost in Translation" - watch "Dirty Pretty Things", and then we'll talk about what the good ending is.