Waste of time

A brilliant film that helped define a genre

Great movie. Not sure what people expected but I found it highly entertaining.

There are moments that feel comical, some horrific, and some downright inspiring but the tonal shifts hardly matter as the end results come to a film that's perfect for this time.

Really excellent but clearly embarrassed caste with a really awful script. So disappointed. Just one cliche after another.

When a movie I see on TV starts with the logo for popcornflix.com, I know that I likely can't count on too much appearing on IMDb, so I watch these movies more carefully to provide IMDb with as much information as I can. In this case it didn't help. I had no idea what was going on. A car blew up and a man in bed with a beautiful woman got a phone call. There were cops in London, some of whom were apparently corrupt, and a rich man who wanted to get his drug dealing son out of trouble. I think one of the cops may have gone undercover, but I'm not sure. I couldn't remember which person was which. There was a car chase which was pretty good. There was a chase on foot that was also somewhat exciting. London was interesting to look at, if that was where the movie was set. There was a fascinating futuristic glass-walled room high in the air that overlooked a river. The Thames?I saw what looked like that scene from "Mission: Impossible", but if you enjoyed that scene, there's really nothing here. That sequence ends with rappelling down a building, but it's not a big deal. I remember one really good acting performance from Terence Maynard, who ended up being tougher than he looked at first.Do I have any more to say? Not really.

"All things to all men", a British film about the underworld and the involvement of corrupt police in it. In the end, almost everyone is dead, both the good and the bad, except one novice policeman who captures the sense of the movie. The closing scene brings a rather disjointed and difficult to follow story together with several notable quotes: "There's no right or wrong, only winners and losers." And the closing dialogue: Police Commissioner: "Can you be trusted?" Attorney General: "He means, 'Are you loyal to the system?'" Dickson: "what I don't understand, if a cop doesn't commit perjury, you'll never get a conviction. The undercovers on the street cause more damage than those they're trying to catch. The only way to take a criminal off the streets is to take away all their cash, because if you don't somewhere down the line they're going to buy their way out. Even now, it feels like I'm lying even when I'm telling the truth." Attorney General: "Something like that." Police Commissioner: (with a smile, acknowledging Dickson's desired promotion) "Detective". The closing dialogue constitutes a stinging critique of the "system," the subtle and dangerous symbiotic interplay between the forces of good and evil, and how the line between them in practice is invisible. The British accent made the dialogue extremely difficult to follow at times. The story slowly builds a plot that comes to a satisfying climax with the final denouement.

Movie is plodding and predictable. I only found it because I am indulging a Rufus Sewell swoon, saw the title listed in his IMDb credits and located it on Netflix. The Bad: The "plot" is a pastiche of so many (better) movies from the past 20-30 years. Actually from the beginning of movie-making (smile).The Good: So many terrific character actors with arresting faces (another reason I love Rufus). So it was worth a watch late on a Friday night. Relaxed with a drink in hand. Linking the faces to other movies and TV series.Over the past 2 years, I have binge-watched so many Brit and Aussie TV series and movies especially. I favor crime and drama. A long visit to London (and the Cotswolds) is on my bucket list. So while I respect the reviewers who say this movie doesn't present the London they know, the exterior shots sure look inviting to me here in Pennsylvania. Having lived previously in Washington, D.C., and environs, I know the annoyances of seeing exteriors that truly do not represent that city.