Shane Meadows' dark and disturbing morality tale plays like a bleak spin on any number of genres: 70s Brit gangsters, 50s westerns, 80s stalk-and-slash, 60s kitchen sink dramas, and modern urban crime flicks this film gives each varying degrees of recognition as it tells a story that will shock all but the emotionally numb. What appears at first to be a straightforward revenge tale becomes increasingly complex as it approaches its climax, and grows progressively more internalised as it examines the subverted influence acts of revenge wreak upon their perpetrator.
DEAD MAN'S SHOES is a violent film, and its violence is all the more shocking for the calculated manner in which it is dispensed; in a blistering performance that is never anything less than totally convincing, Paddy Considine essays a man in whom violence brims beneath the surface; it's a controlled and purposeful rage that he controls, however, one that drives him on to avenge a wrong committed against his family, and which is aimed only at those who have committed that wrong. Considine's character is so intensely portrayed that every time he is in the presence of one of his quarry you can't help but tense up as you wait for him to erupt. More often than not, he tricks us, knowing that anticipation is (for the viewer at least) more unbearable than the actual event. The low-life he is gunning for aren't portrayed as evil men, merely stupid and self-important, the kind that are all too often seen in every bar in every town, eager for self-gratification and willing to obtain it at the expense of others. We've all come across them, and we've all wished to teach them a lesson but we've never had reason enough to do so. Meadows and Considine show us the personal consequences if we should, and their message is as precisely and accurately delivered as one of Richard's acts of violence.
There are plot holes in the story, and some of them are a little too glaring to be overlooked, which means the film suffers as a result. The twist is fairly obvious to anyone with a rudimentary knowledge of film plotting, and the viewer is left strangely adrift once the carnage begins and we suddenly discover there is no moral anchor with whom we can identify. But then, I suspect that is the intention: the precise moment when our empathy with Richard is broken can be identified, and it causes us to stop and think, and wonder whether an act of revenge can ever be justified.
The acting is top-notch, especially from Considine and Toby Kebbell as his simple brother. Gary Stretch, with his weathered features, will never be the pin-up he used to be as a boxer in the early 90s, but delivers a performance here that suggests he could have a successful acting career ahead of him.
DEAD MAN'S SHOES is a violent film, and its violence is all the more shocking for the calculated manner in which it is dispensed; in a blistering performance that is never anything less than totally convincing, Paddy Considine essays a man in whom violence brims beneath the surface; it's a controlled and purposeful rage that he controls, however, one that drives him on to avenge a wrong committed against his family, and which is aimed only at those who have committed that wrong. Considine's character is so intensely portrayed that every time he is in the presence of one of his quarry you can't help but tense up as you wait for him to erupt. More often than not, he tricks us, knowing that anticipation is (for the viewer at least) more unbearable than the actual event. The low-life he is gunning for aren't portrayed as evil men, merely stupid and self-important, the kind that are all too often seen in every bar in every town, eager for self-gratification and willing to obtain it at the expense of others. We've all come across them, and we've all wished to teach them a lesson but we've never had reason enough to do so. Meadows and Considine show us the personal consequences if we should, and their message is as precisely and accurately delivered as one of Richard's acts of violence.
There are plot holes in the story, and some of them are a little too glaring to be overlooked, which means the film suffers as a result. The twist is fairly obvious to anyone with a rudimentary knowledge of film plotting, and the viewer is left strangely adrift once the carnage begins and we suddenly discover there is no moral anchor with whom we can identify. But then, I suspect that is the intention: the precise moment when our empathy with Richard is broken can be identified, and it causes us to stop and think, and wonder whether an act of revenge can ever be justified.
The acting is top-notch, especially from Considine and Toby Kebbell as his simple brother. Gary Stretch, with his weathered features, will never be the pin-up he used to be as a boxer in the early 90s, but delivers a performance here that suggests he could have a successful acting career ahead of him.