That was an excellent one.

Sorry, this movie sucks

Don't listen to the negative reviews

There is, somehow, an interesting story here, as well as some good acting. There are also some good scenes

Sexy Beast (2000) Reviewed by Martin Davis. Retrospect Film on Facebook. London villain goes into retirement on the Costa del Crime but is 'persuaded' back to do one last job. It's the kind of story told many times before, often badly. Jonathan Glazers' directorial debut however, revisits this old territory with a unique style of its own. From the surreal dream sequences to the razor sharp dialogue, it never lets up. Ex-con and safe-cracker Gary "Gal" Dove (Ray Winstone) is enjoying his idyllic lifestyle in Spain with his beloved wife DeeDee (Amanda Redman) and his longtime friend Aitch and his wife Jackie. Their tranquillity is shattered by the arrival of an old criminal associate, Don Logan (Ben Kingsley). Logan has been sent out to bring Gal back for a major bank heist and he's not taking no for an answer. The reaction of Gal and DeeDee and their friends, upon hearing of Logans' imminent arrival, sets the tone for this most unwelcome of visitors. It's the measure of a great actor that the man who earlier in his career had played the title role in Richard Attenboroughs' 'Gandhi' is so convincing in the role of a vicious sociopath. From the moment he appears on-screen Kingsleys' ferocious portrayal of Logan dominates every scene he appears in and his fearsome presence begins a chain of events from which there will be no going back. Upon returning to London Gal is reunited with Teddy Bass, the heist organiser, played by Ian McShane, another superb performance. In any other film McShane would have won the acting plaudits. The film lingers long in the memory for Kingsleys' role though. The cast and quality of acting turn 'Sexy Beast' from a standard crime caper film into something quite different. Winstone is excellent as Gal, a man whose past demons come back to consume him and push him to breaking point. There is also a terrific performance from Amanda Redman as DeeDee, his beleaguered wife. Crime thrillers rarely portray female lead characters with any real substance but Amanda Redman here, like Sharon Stone in Scorseses' 'Casino' is a notable exception. Seventeen years on 'Sexy Beast' still stands as one of the best crime thrillers ever made. In 2004 it was voted 15th best British film of all time by 'Total Film' magazine. Highly Recommended. Martin Davis. Retrospect Film on Facebook

Quite possibly the most unique gangster movie I've seen. The part of Don Logan expertly played by Ben Kingsley is easily one of the most intimidating characters ever captured on celluloid. It delivers lines of dialogue that you'll never forget not that you'd want to. It's an absolute perfectly titled film. Worth watching and re-watching to catch any of the little bits you might have missed.

Don "Malky" Logan: "I love you, Gal. You're lovable. Big lovable bloke."The story is about a former gangster who has made a modest amount of money from his criminal career. Happy to put his life of crime behind him, he has retired with his wife Deedee (Amanda Redman) to the sunny bliss of rural Spain, where he lives an idyllic life with his family and a few close friends. But Gary's contentment is ruptured by an unwelcome visitor from his past -- Don (Ben Kingsley), a former associate who has been hired to assemble a team of criminals to rob a heavily guarded bank. Don wants Gary in on the job, and is less than pleased by Gary's unwillingness to volunteer his services. What ensues is a battle of wills between the two men, with Don intimidating, prodding, and manipulating his onetime friend to get what he wants, forever changing the lives of those around him in the process.Jonathan Glazer seems to be like one of those directors that only direct's movies if he really wants to put in his pure passion, his soul and effort to do so, and how I know that is by looking at his other two movies that he made so far and those two movies have proved that he takes time with filming and he only picks the films that's right for him. Sexy Beast is another great example of that.Ray Winstone may play the same character in every movie that his in. Playing the tough angry British guy in every movie his in, but in this that's not the case, he actually played a character...wow. Ray Winstone is a good actor and I do like him has a person and I'm happy that he's in a movie that shows his talent. Great work Winstone.Ben Kingsley in this movie probably pulls off his best performance that I've seen him in. He plays the loud month guy that dose you head in and in a strange way I kind of like him, even when I shouldn't, it's like J.K Simmons in Whiplash where in that movie you got Fletcher a mean, ass-hole who you just want to hit but at the same time kind of like him and not fully hate him, and that's basically Kingsley in this movie. Kingsley is always brilliant in every movie but in this I think he really dose shine and in my opinion it's my favorite performance from him.Now for problems: My only little nick pick with this movie is the that in some scenes in this movie that was a little bit slow and that's it really.Overall Sexy Beast is a movie that's acted well, directed and shot beautifully and overall a well done film. But it's also a movie that not everyone is going to like, but everyone can agree to disagree of things.

By the years of 2000-2001, the crime genre was becoming a little stale. While directors like Quentin Tarantino or Guy Ritchie had made the genre fresh again in the 90's, they had inspired many others who copied their unique style of film-making to a much lesser degree, creating many films which ranged from merely being bad (e.g. Best Laid Plans, The Big Hit) or were completely morally bankrupt (e.g. The Boondock Saints, Natural Born Killers). Because of this, it was easy to cynically prejudge many crime films that were coming out in that era. Occasionally however, you have exceptions to this rule which manage to stand out on their own and not fall into the trappings of crime films of that era, like L.A Confidential, Seven & The Usual Suspects. Unfortunately, despite what it's glowing reviews, box office figures and awards nominations may tell you, Sexy Beast isn't one of those films. While not being a complete disaster it is a very uninspired film that it is so safe and predictable that it feels more like a straight to DVD film rather than anything else.The plot is that a retired gangster, Gary Dove, is currently living a quiet life in Spain, with his wife and friends in a luxury villa. However, his peace is shattered when his former boss Don Logan abruptly arrives asking him to do one last job involving robbing one of London's most high tech banks. A conflicted Gary now has to decide whether to stay in peace and shelter or return for one last time into a dark underworld that might cost him dearly. The plot may sound very engaging at first, but it suffers from being utterly predictable, making the story lack any sort of tension or threat. It doesn't help that the heist isn't the movie's main focus, as most of the movie is spent focusing on the main character and how his decisions will affect those in the movie around him. While that does make the movie sound like an interesting character study, it isn't as there is little time focused on the main character's conflict, and rather is spent more time on Tarantino- esque conversations that don't advance the story much or Ben Kingsley's Don Logan, a character who seems entirely superfluous to the narrative, which considering how he takes up a lot of screen time is a major problem. The heist also suffers from the fact that the characters pull it off so easily and are unaffected by it's minimal consequences because of it, leading to a complete lack of tension in the process. This highlights the film's main problem: there is nothing at stake here, as the plot is so predictable and simple, the main heist of the film is so easy to pull off and NONE of the characters change at all by the end of the film as a result. This makes the film all the more pointless of an experience to watch because of it.However, there are some positive attributes that this movie has to offer. The film is at least very well-made and all of the cast work give great performances and the film at least has some style. Music video director Jonathan Glazer does the best he can with such bland material by giving the film look good, using some clever camera-work and has art-house touches here and there, particularly a demonic rabbit motif that looks like something out of the deleted scenes of Donnie Darko. All of these stylistic touches are great, making it look like Terry Gilliam directing a gangster movie, and it helps the film get some much-needed distinction. I just wish with material this generic, Glazer had tried to be more ambitious and risky and had made the film more art-house by cranking his Kubrick, Gilliam and Fincher influences up to 11, as it may have been more memorable film. Sure it may have been more pretentious, but at least I would have admired it more because of it for being ambitious. A film like Snatch for example that came out at a similar time tries to recapture the brilliant plotting of Pulp Fiction, but fails, becoming an incoherent mess in the process and proved that director Guy Ritchie was way out of his depth. While at least I could admire that movie for at least having ambition, Sexy Beast mostly lacks this and when it does try to be artistically challenging, you can tell there is a more provocative and compelling gangster flick in there struggling to get out. As it is though, this is your standard Tarantino-esque knock-off whose plot so safe and characters so uninteresting that there is nothing truly memorable about the film apart from a few scenes, making it feel like this should have stayed away from theaters and should have gone straight-to-DVD where it belongs. Sure it's nowhere near as bad as 44 Inch Chest (although few movies are that bad), which is from the same writers and features much of the same cast, as Sexy Beast is average rather than flat-out awful. It's clearly well-made, has a great cast and that director Jonathan Glazer has talent and shows potential for his future endeavors into film- making. However, it suffers from similar problems as 44 Inch Chest: it spends an hour focusing on pointless build-up, but fails to develop an interesting narrative or characters in that time and when the film gets to its main set-piece it is a major disappointment, making the viewing experience feel rather superfluous. Sure, while there are great performances and brilliant artistic touches here and there, all in all, this is just a safe and generic trope that despite its strong word of mouth should have gone straight-to-DVD, due to its lack trying to do anything innovative and experimental to a genre that by this point in time had run out of steam.