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Film Description
Quite simply the best British crime film for a generation. Ray Winstone adds a new level of complex vulnerability to his stock-in-trade hardman performance as Gal, a professional criminal who has retired with his wife to a lazy villa in Spain. But the sun-blessed idyll of paella on the veranda and cocktails by the pool is shattered by the arrival of his psychotic old flame Don (Ben Kingsley), whose mission is to entice Gal back to Blighty for a major blag. Kingsley's performance is nothing less than electrifying; Jonathan Glazer's direction confident, stylish but unshowy. In time, Sexy Beast should surpass Get Carter as the daddy of all British gangster films.
You know the story...likeable tough-guy decides to go straight...shifts himself and his family away from the London criminal underworld to the balmy climes of the Span... more >
You know the story...likeable tough-guy decides to go straight...shifts himself and his family away from the London criminal underworld to the balmy climes of the Spanish Riviera...but his past catches up with him when a former associate tracks him down to try and lure him back for one last job...and this guy won't take "no" for an answer. Sounds like fairly standard gangster-type fare, no?
What makes Sexy Beast such compelling viewing is a singularly astonishing performance of menace and intensity from Ben Kingsley as Don, a man on such a short fuse that he seems permanently on the brink of exploding with eye-popping mania at someone or something (and he does so, frequently). Ray Winstone is excellent in an understated role as Gal but must now be so accustomed to this kind of thing that he could probably turn out such a performance in his sleep - indeed, taking into consideration his recent televisual performance as a Cock-er-nee Henry VIII, he may be in some danger of being typecast.
Kingsley, however, is the man who, lest we forget, dressed up in a loin cloth in the early '80s to portray Gandhi, an icon of serenity and intelligent, rational thought. His character here (and portrayal thereof) could hardly be more different but he pulls it off quite spectacularly and, frankly, at times terrifyingly. < less
Gary Dove is a contented ex-con now retired to a Spanish villa paradise. When a vicious former associate turns up and forces him to do one last job, he has to defend e... more >
Gary Dove is a contented ex-con now retired to a Spanish villa paradise. When a vicious former associate turns up and forces him to do one last job, he has to defend everything he holds dear in a shocking battle of wills. < less
Sexy Beast is quite simply the best British crime film for a generation. Ray Winstone adds a new level of complex vulnerability to his stock-in-trade hardman performa... more >
Sexy Beast is quite simply the best British crime film for a generation. Ray Winstone adds a new level of complex vulnerability to his stock-in-trade hardman performance as Gal, a professional criminal who has retired with his wife to a lazy villa in Spain. But the sun-blessed idyll of paella on the veranda and cocktails by the pool is shattered by the arrival of his psychotic old flame Don (Ben Kingsley), whose mission is to entice Gal back to Blighty for a major blag. Kingsley\'s performance is nothing less than electrifying; Jonathan Glazer's direction confident, stylish but unshowy. In time, Sexy Beast should surpass Get Carter as the daddy of all British gangster films.
