Film Review: Harry Brown

Harry Brown. 103 mins. Rated MA15+. Directed by Daniel Barber. Written by Gary Young.

‘The Vigilante’ archetype has been an enigmatic and hugely successful character in film – exemplified by no-one more successfully than Clint Eastwood’s career-defining ‘Dirty Harry’. When the defenceless and hard-done-by need rescuing from their perilous situation, there can be something undeniably exhilarating about the man with the serious weaponry arriving on the scene to ensure justice – or at least the cinema’s often altruistic version of it – is done.

Harry Brown (Michael Caine) is an elderly man dealing with overwhelming grief. His beloved wife is lying comatose in hospital and the poverty-stricken housing estate in which they live is ruled by a gang of drug-dealing thugs, who terrorise the community with murders, bashings and random acts of extreme violence and intimidation. When Harry's best friend Leonard (David Bradley) is murdered in the pedestrian underpass that he, himself, is too scared to use, Harry decides to takes matters into his own hands by holding each gang member personally accountable for Leonard’s violent and senseless death.

Not since Danny Boyle’s Trainspotting (1996) has there been such an astonishing emergence of a potent new voice in British cinema. Barber (in his feature film debut) has delivered a supremely confident, angry and impatient vision of a community in extreme danger of self-annihilation. Young’s screenplay is vicious in both its near-flawless structural simplicity and the manner in which it divides the ‘good’ from the ‘evil’ with razor sharp authority.

Michael Caine – at the peak of his powers – gives one of the greatest performances of his career. His every move – from the subtly endearing, grieving old man going about the details of his daily ritual to his transformation into the ex-Marine taking revenge with military flair and precision – is unerringly brilliant. Emily Mortimer (Shutter Island) is superb as Detective Inspector Alice Frampton, and the supporting cast attack their roles (and each other) with passion, skill and undeniable ferocity.

The film’s extraordinary visual style, superbly photographed in painstaking detail by cinematographer Martin Ruhe (The Countess), sets the action in the heart of a pre-apocalyptic environment – magnificently realised by art director Chris Lowe (The Golden Compass, The Constant Gardener) and production designer Kave Quinn (Trainspotting).

Harry Brown’s vision is a bleak one – owing more to Shakespeare’s tragedies than it does to The Bill. The violence and mayhem, which many may find extremely confronting, is savagely realistic. But for those who have experienced violence and assault or have feared for their safety and their lives, this is a film that unapologetically demands we consider the very essence of social order and justice.

This review was commissioned by the Geraldton Newspapers Group and was published in the print edition of the Midwest Times.