Charlie (2003/4)
Picture: B
Sound: B- Extras: C- Film: C+
The British Gangster film has been on par in many cases
with its American counterparts for decades.
In 1990, when many a brutal American Gangster film was produced, Peter
Medak’s The Krays was as brutal and relentless as what Scorsese,
Coppola, The Coen Brothers and Phil Joanou delivered, along with its unique
humor. The genre exposed a new
generation of crime with Guy Ritchie’s Lock, Stock & Two Smoking Barrels,
then he cleverly crossed the British and American sensibilities with Snatch. Along with Matthew Vaughan’s recent Layer
Cake, Malcolm Needs’ much lesser known and seen Charlie (2003/4)
arrived. The film stars Luke Goss as
the title character, Charlie Richardson, who keeps the film going no matter how
problematic it gets.
You see, in the 1960s, Charlie ruled crime in the part of
England not covered by The Krays. He
also seems to have had more trouble with the authorities and got into some
compromising positions against his own government when he gets involved more
deeply with military power in South Africa than he should. There is a good story to tell here, but the
screenplays combination of awkward flashback style and the film’s endless
attempts to imitate Martin Scorsese’s Casino (1995) always manage to
hurt it every time it promises to get interesting and take off. Steven Berkoff also stars as Richardson’s
father and Marius Weyers is quite good as the powerful South African General
Van Den Bergh.
The anamorphically enhanced 1.85 X 1 image is surprisingly
good, with subtle color changes, solid video black and good detail more often
than not. Cinematographer Zoran
Veljkovic does well when he is not imitating Robert Richardson’s work on Casino,
including some work that leads to split screen moments. The Dolby Digital 5.1 mix is not bad, but is
not out of the ordinary, while the use of songs is too Scorsese to be
believed. Yawn! The only extra is an original trailer, but
it is a good one for a change. Fox has
issued this under the “Key DVD” name, trying possibly to revive one of their
VHS brand names from the 1980s. We’ll
see how that plays out.
- Nicholas Sheffo
