Sexy Beast.

Review #2501: Sexy Beast.

Cast: 

Ray Winstone (Gary 'Gal' Dove), Ben Kingsley (Don Logan), Ian McShane (Teddy Bass), Amanda Redman (DeeDee Dove), James Fox (Harry), Cavan Kendall (Aitch), Julianne White (Jackie), and Álvaro Monje (Enrique) Directed by Jonathan Glazer.

Review: 

"I’m not the kind of director who has 10 projects on the go to see which one works out. It feels more like music to me — I have this idea for an album and I want to make it. If I do something, I have to do it well and sometimes that takes a little time."

I suppose I should've done this one sooner. Sexy Beast was the debut feature film of Jonathan Glazer, who grew up in London to a Reform Jewish family (he noted that that in his childhood, he encountered various "East End Jews who had moved to the suburbs for a better quality of life" that imprinted on him with their culture) saw him attend Jewish Free School. He then went to art school because he believed that drawing was the only thing he was good at. However, he got into the habit of directing because there were friends of his in bands that wanted him to shoot music videos for them. Eventually, after graduating with a degree in theatre design from Nottingham Trent University, Glazer got into making film trailers and eventually got into doing commercials; eventually, he did videos for bands such as Radiohead. Apparently, Glazer was slated to direct for the first time with the movie Gangster No. 1 which was written by Louis Mellis and David Scinto based on their play before disagreements with the casting led to all three people leaving (Paul McGuigan eventually made the film in 2000). According to Scinto, Sexy Beast "was born, out of a reaction to all that chaos and soap opera", going from a stage play draft with the working title "Gangster No. 2" to, well, Sexy Beast; the two had one further collaboration turned into a film with 44 Inch Chest (released in 2009 which also featured McShane and Winstone). Made for a budget of roughly $4 million that premiered in the festival circuit in 2000 before going into theaters in 2001, the movie was a light decent hit with audiences, apparently more so in America than expected. Glazer has since directed select commercial advertisements and three further films (which unlike Beast had Glazer serve as co-writer) with Birth (2004), Under the Skin (2013) and The Zone of Interest (2023), which won an Academy Award for Best International Feature Film*.

Glazer apparently called the making of the film "perfect baptism for me" because of the writing that he could trust completely for a film that is particularly intense in its dialogue for what Glazer once called "neo noir" that is basically trying to have a heist while avoiding being a "heist movie". Shaggy dog heist film or not, there is plenty of mischief to experience within the obvious qualities that come with Winstone being paired with Kingsley. It's because you get a passively bulked sunburned lead presence paired with someone who basically is fighting with him on a primal level with such a level of containment that is actually pretty frightening. At least, for a movie that basically shows the upcoming storm by having a boulder crash down the hill onto a pool in the opening minutes. So yes, you can't really hide from your past, but you can sure try to confront the present to maintain a worthwhile future. Within its aspects of the thriller is black comedy that actually is quite entertaining in the machinations of how you can make 88 minutes roll along where you aren't thinking about the heist as much as you are experiencing pros at work. Kingsley just has that magic to startle you with his presence and where he packs his expressions and dialogue in a way that just sounds tailor-made to him while Winstone lumbers as one could only do as someone who aspires to stay in their particular corner of the burning sun (as opposed to the burn of the heist). McShane is intimidating enough in the brief moments one sees of him around the scene of the growing crime (consider how the last scene sees him and Winstone talk about the various truths that lie under the surface). The heist in London isn't the point, it's a film all about what you see and hear in Spain more than anything, I imagine. As a whole, Sexy Beast is basically an acquired taste that either sticks with you or just leaves out the back door. I thought it was curious enough within its maneuvering of the crime film with humor and solid enough performances to make the journey worth watching.

Overall, I give it 8 out of 10 stars.

*It was set in 1943 in the life of German Auschwitz commandant Rudolf Höss filmed in German, Polish, and Yiddish. I hear it's a good movie. I just want to mention that film mostly because the Oscar speech he did talked about the ongoing Gaza war that managed to make a whole bunch of people look like petulant children.