Blood Ties, Cannes Film Festival - film review

Actor, writer and director Guillaume Canet chooses a rip-roaring crime story as his first American film
P44 Film: Blood Ties
21 May 2013

The French were among the first to elevate American gangster movies to the level of high art. So it isn't surprising that actor, writer and director Guillaume Canet chose a rip-roaring crime story as his first American film.

Being Canet, however, he lays as much emphasis on character as on shoot-ups or action sequences. Those who remember Tell No One will know he expects his actors to mine their parts as deeply as possible.

His two central characters here are brothers. Fifty-year-old Chris (Clive Owen) is just out of prison and unlikely to avoid a further dip into crime. Frank, his younger sibling (Billy Crudup) is a cop with a bright future. A veteran James Caan is their father who strangely prefers his bad-boy son.

Marion Cotillard, Mila Kunis and Zoe Saldana are the mixed-up women, tortured by men who are likely to lose their lives on the dangerous streets of New York in the early Seventies. It is brother against brother and both against a probably bloody fate.

Canet gives Owen, in an unlikely part, and Crudup every chance to shine and sets his scene well. But in the end this long film seems a mixture of European and American sensibilities that don’t quite match up.

Cannes Film Festival runs until Sunday (festival-cannes.fr).

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