Harry Brown
HARRY BROWN (18)
D: Daniel Barber
Lions Gate/Marv Partners/UK Film Council (Kris Thykier,
Matthew Vaughn, Matthew Brown & Keith Bell)
US 2009
99 mins
Crime/Drama
W: Gary Young
DP: Martin Ruhe
Ed: Joe Walker
Mus: Martin Phipps & Ruth Barrett
Michael Caine (Harry Brown), Emily Mortimer
(D.I. Alice Frampton), Charlie Creed Miles (Sgt. Terry Hicock), David Bradley (Len Attwell), Sean Harris (Stretch), Ben Drew (Noel Winters), Jack O'Connell (Marky), Liam Cunningham (Sid
Rourke)
Michael Caine is Harry Brown, a pensioner who wants to use the
subway near his local council estate but can't because feral yobs are up to no good, so he decides to get Gran Torino/Death Wish/Straw Dogs/Taxi Driver on their asses.
While Michael Caine is excellent in his portrayal of a
OAP-vigilante, the other characters in this film are just one-dimensional without being properly fleshed out. The yobs are complete and utter deplorable scum while the rest of the characters may
as well be part of the furniture (in fact, a female heroin addict pretty much is).
Overall, Harry Brown is a typically average thriller funded by
the UK Film Council, written by a middle-class liberal who doesn't have a clue about life on a housing estate paired with a debutante director who knows even less and if it weren't for Michael
Caine's performance it would be no more or less enjoyable than a TV movie-of-the-week.
5/10
