A blackly comic, neo-noir heist picture, Australian screenwriter Scott Roberts's directing debut fairly oozes strenuous eccentricity. Robert's models seem to have been the pulp novels of Jim Thompson, Guy Ritchie's laddish LOCK, STOCK AND TWO SMOKING BARRELS (1998) and SNATCH (2000) by way of the Coen brothers' BLOOD SIMPLE (1984). But his film's hard-boiled excesses are more reminiscent of 1970s Italian crime pictures, which ratcheted up the violence and cynicism of their American models but invariably lost something in the translation. Imprisoned brothers Dale (Guy Pearce), Mal (Damien Richardson) and Shane Twentyman (Joel Edgerton) have always abided by a few simp...
Released:
2002
Rated:
R
Length:
103 mins