Horrible, fascist and poorly acted

Am I Missing Something?

Your blood may run cold, but you now find yourself pinioned to the story.

The thing I enjoyed most about the film is the fact that it doesn't shy away from being a super-sized-cliche;

What is the worst film ever made? That's a though question, seeing as how film is a very popular art form, as is highlighted by the amount of films there in, both in the past and present. Many of them are masterpieces, while many others are total garbage that no-one should ever see. With so many bad films out there, it can be quite hard to fully determine an answer to that question. However, while many films are rubbish and entertaining, others are just flat out rubbish and boring. This leads many to another complex question: what is the dullest film ever made? Sure, while there are many bad films out there, most of them aren't dull, and even some good movies can be accused of being dull, so it is also a hard question to answer. However, I think that this film is the answer to that question. 44 Inch Chest, a barely-seen low budget British gangster film form 2010, is (in my opinion at least) while not the worst film ever made, it is surely the absolute dullest.Firstly, let's discuss the plot. Colin, a Cockney gangster gets heartbroken after his wife leaves him in favour of another man. In retaliation, his gangster friends kidnap the guy and take him to Colin, as he decides what to do with him, whether that would be forgiving him or killing him. That's the entire plot of the movie. While I don't mind a film having a simple plot, the plot here is very simple to the point of non-existence and the film's achingly slow pace don't help matters, especially with the filler they put in to pad out the length, which is mainly highlighted when Colin's friends discuss another film (Samson and Delilah by Cecil B Demille) in parallel to the situation taking place as well as bringing back the wife character during the film who does barely anything to advance the plot.I said earlier that the film was the dullest film ever. The main reason for that is it's slow pace, and that for the whole running time, nothing seems to happen in the film. There is barely any character development, many of the events in the story seem inconsequential and the film stops rather than ends, meaning that we never know what happened to the main character and whether his actions throughout the film have made him a better person or if he is as still as psychotic as he was before.It doesn't help matters that Colin is very unlikeable. Now, I understand that his character was cheated on, which is something I can sympathize with. What I don't sympathize with however is that Colin is a raving lunatic who brutally attacks his wife for infidelity (even going as far as to chuck her out of the window of their house) and due to his weird outbursts throughout the film, clearly seems to have some sort of psychotic disorder and is very unpredictable, which implies that he has acted similarly to his wife previously, which gives her more than enough justification for cheating on him. None of the other characters are much better. I know this film has an ensemble cast of Britain's best actors, and I should be mad that the film would waste a cast like this, but to be honest there are so many other problems with this heap of manure that the waste of these actors is the least of it's problems. It doesn't help that many of them are given nothing to do, as Tom Wilkinson, Ian Mcshane and Joanne Whalley give good performances despite having nothing to work with. The worst offender surprisingly is John Hurt, as his character is really annoying and the fact that he swears a lot doesn't help.That's another thing that's wrong with this trash, the excessive cussing. I'm not a prude, but the amount of f and c bombs is embarrassing, as they do it very often and it goes really extreme at some points, and it has the mentality of a young kid swearing in order to impress the big boys. I'm sorry, saying the c word for the 20th time won't stop your audience from passing out into a coma. Seriously, this script feels like it was written by 12 year olds who loved Reservoir Dogs and wanted to make a Kubrick version of it.Yes that is what this movie is setting out to do: make Reservoir Dogs if made by Kubrick. Despite how awful that already sounds, the result is far worse, as unlike Reservoir Dogs, there is no tension, laughs or fun due to the achingly slow pace and how the "revenge" part of the plot doesn't begin until an hour in. There is also no revenge in the film, as Colin doesn't do anything to the man who slept with his wife, despite the fact that she was beaten up pretty badly for infidelity. Sure it succeeds in very Kubrickian and there is great cinematography but that also means a slow pace which kills any sort of excitement that you might have. There are honestly many pointless parts here, and you can skip them without missing any plot, especially the Samson and Delilah footage, which does make me think that I could be watching that instead of this garbage. Overall, this is just dull rubbish. The pace is achingly slow, the characters are uninteresting, and there is no resolution to the weak plot that is padded out to get to 90 minutes. The fact that such a great cast is wasted is the least of it's crimes. Stay far far away from this. This is by far the dullest film ever made, and not in a good way.

Ray Winstone stars as Colin Diamond a man who finds out that his wife has cheated and is leaving him for another man, which takes Colin and his gangster friends to kidnap his wife's lover and decide what revenge to take. This film intrigued me from the start as it slowly revealed the story bit by bit, Ray Winstone brilliantly plays Colin who's become a disillusioned shell of a man from the crushing news about his wife. The cast is stellar with Ian McShane simply oozing coolness throughout the film. For the majority of the film being in a dingy small room I felt the story had a lot to say about love, and at times especially a speech Colin says is better than many of the rom-coms about that you forget as soon as you've watched. There is also fantastic dark humour which could make this the ideal rom-com for the right couple.

Not what I was expecting, but all the more incredible for it. 44 Inch Chest is an examination of the male ego and the damage it can undergo. Luckily, it avoids all pretentiousness by being hilariously crass and smutty. It may come as a turnoff to some, but never has love and commitment been put into words with such passion and resonance as when Ray Winstone asks his wife's lover "Has she ever farted in front of you?" It's simple, but touching and brutal. Each of Winstone's friends embodies a different notch on the spectrum of masculinity. McShane is the love 'em and leave 'em guy, Hurt plays a fantastically foul and cantankerous black and white kind of guy. Each has endless quotable dialogue that may be full of expletives, butis modestly profound. A thinker and a talker, this is more stage play/psychological analysis than it is the cockney gangster revenge flick you might be expecting. A wonderful film that hits every target it takes aim at.

You couldn't ask for more from a quality cast but what they had to play with was neither compelling nor cohesive, the whole time I was waiting for something memorable to happen but it never came. There is however an odd pun and memory flashback which keeps the storyline on track. To sum it up 44" Chest barely stirs enough interest to endure what feels like casual conversation with over the top foul language.On a seemingly unrelated note, whatever happened to Mr. Black magic's dark world of the east end gangster? I know this release wasn't connected to Sexy Beast but surely now there can be no prequel or sequel.