Revolver

It's a sign of the times that Guy Ritchie is a famous film director. That he isn't famous for being a film director is all too evident from this waste of screen time. Ritchie makes hysterical efforts with Revolver to marry a con story, a la David Mamet, with the sort of hocus pocus that The Magus, John Fowles's novel, is full of. There are signs (and portents and symbols) a-plenty but they signify nothing other than, perhaps, the Ritchie family's dabbling in early Middle-Eastern arcana. The result is a series of pretentious cul-de-sacs. Ritchie's story, for what it's worth, picks up with Jake Green (Statham) a gambler two years out of prison and intent on exacting revenge against gang boss Macha (Liotta). After this unoriginal set-up the audience is asked to accept (a) that Jake is conned into believing he has a medical condition giving him three days to live and (b) that he gives his hard-won loot to Zack and Avi (Pastore and Benjamin) two mysterious loan sharks who say they will keep him alive, or else. The rest is clumsy slight of hand, portentous aphorisms, and tiresome revelations. There are three shiny American cars, all the same model. There are shooters, gratuitous scantily-clad ladies, animation, and original lines like "Speak to me or I'll kill you like the ... dog that you are..." Oh, and Francesca Annis turns up as a sort of elderly Pussy Galore looking like the costume designer from The Incredibles. It is incredibly bad.