A film that leaves no cliche untrampled.
Gritty, complex and thrilling, The Town is the must-see film of the week.
This is a tough urban thriller that ranks with the best recent efforts in the genre.
It’s the relationship between Doug and Jimmy that gives The Town much of its dramatic and thematic heft, neatly sketching a tight-lipped community of blood brothers and codes of honour, even if the movie as a whole never quite achieves the moral complexity of Affleck’s magnificent Gone Baby Gone.
This is tripe with character.
The energy, power and confidence with which director Ben Affleck puts together this blue-collar crime opera commands attention, and he even gets away with some of the macho-sentimentalism that always tends to sink this kind of movie.
With so much happening, the film’s shortcomings are easily pushed to the side.
A lean, mean crime drama.
The characters are interesting but the conventional plot fails to ignite and the James Cagney ending is clichéd and weak.
For Affleck, it may not be the greatest stride forward in theme or setting — the material is tried and trusted, almost to the point of squareness — but it’s a welcome advance in good old behind-the-camera craftsmanship.
Affleck proves with The Town that he really has found his true calling: as a film-maker/actor, not the other way around.
The Town is an admirable example of familiar material brought to life by fresh direction, attentive acting and bright writing.
The Town is that rare beast, a grown-up genre flick, chock-full of compelling character dynamics and a clutch of pitch-perfect performances. It also proves that Gone Baby Gone was no fluke, and confirms Ben Affleck (yes, Ben Affleck) as a major director in the making.
The loudest shoot-outs since Michael Mann, Renner mining Cagney and Fate propelling events à la Mystic River – yet The Town is more indebted to life than movies. A triumph.
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General release. Check local listings for show times.
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