IMDB Plot Synopsis: As homicide detective Thomas Craven investigates the death of his activist daughter, he uncovers not only her secret life, but a corporate cover-up and government collusion that attracts an agent tasked with cleaning up the evidence.
- There now seem to be three types of films that have consistent January releases: horrific romantic comedies, movies Gary Oldman inexplicably thinks have good scripts, and vengeful dads operating outside the law scenarios. Edge of Darkness is this year’s Taken, minus 90% of the action and 100% of Liam Neeson’s badassery. (I say this as someone who thought Taken was one of the most ridiculous movies of 2009.)
- How much do I love that the only main character who is female gets murdered in the first five minutes so that her death can serve as a catalyst for unravelling the Evil Doings of the Evil Corporation she works for? I love this zero amount. She’s highly educated, has an incredibly strong moral compass, and gets killed for her efforts. Awesome.
- Also, holy god would I not want to die of radiation poisoning.
- I do not like Danny Huston, I’ve decided. I feel like he never comes across with any degree of intimidation when he’s supposed to; he plays everything a shade too smarmy.
- As per usual, enjoyed the Photoshopping of characters into existing photographs of big-name politicians. This is the kind of job I want.
- Not going to lie, I love it when people get shot in the kneecap in movies.
- I like Ray Winstone and I liked him in this, but it felt like perhaps his character had a much bigger role in an earlier version of the script. I liked the hints we got, but sometimes those hints seemed very awkwardly inserted into the film (e.g. his visit to the doctor’s office).
- Something I’ve never seen in a mainstream movie before (and it’s entirely possible that I haven’t been paying attention previously) is a male character lamenting mournfully about never having had children. Usually this kind of line is saved for rom-coms where the female lead’s biological clock is ticking obnoxiously loud, but I thought this was quite refreshing, especially coming from the toughest character in the film. It just wasn’t something I was expecting.
- Also, I love criminal underworld thugs who have classical educations and are not afraid to use them in everyday conversation.
- Absolutely did not love the daughter’s voice from beyond the grave talking to dear old Mel Gibson. I especially hated when he died and then the two of them ghost-walked out of the hospital together.
- Going through Emma’s bedroom and apartment is like playing Name That Item From The Ikea Catalogue. I have the same duvet cover she does.
- The guy who plays Liz Lemon’s fifth cousin, a.k.a. The Hair, is in this as a smarmy lawyer.
- Ultimate, rocks fall, everybody dies. Like Hamlet.
You’re probably right about Winstone’s character having a bigger role in earlier versions of the script. His equivalent in the original TV series is a much more vital presence in the story, and I couldn’t make any sense of Winstone’s character in this.
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I thought this was a decent film but yes ghost walking at the end was a bit heavy handed but I was ok with that overall because they killed everyone.
Danny Huston may be the actor I find most annoying in the world. He is so pointless. You should watch him in John Adams however if you want to see him be his asshole self and then get shown he is a loser and make him all sad. Loved it.Why is he in so many films? I truly hate him.
One plot point I didn’t like was the whole Danny Huston’s character is insane! Because he wasn’t, he was just a douche. He was selling nuclear weapons to terrorists so he could make shitloads of money with the US govt’s blessing so long as he hid it properly. I got no maniac nutbag head of corp vibe from him. Just total douchebag vibe. Other than of course the whole ‘how does it feel’ line which I think was inserted to show hey see Mel’s daughter is right he’s nuts!
Knee shots are great.
Why was the MASS repub senator SO ugly?
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You’re right, they did a really terrible job with the HE’S INSANE angle because… no, he’s really not.
The senator’s hair particularly bothered me because it looks really artificially grey.
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What is a bechdel test? I keep seeing references to that in the tags and I feel like I’m missing something.
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The Bechdel test has three criteria for movies: 1) It has to have at least two women in it, 2) who talk to each other, 3) about something other than a man. It’s from Alison Bechdel’s comic “Dykes to Watch Out For”, which I’ve never read but owe a large debt of gratitude for coming up with this litmus test.
I’ve started flagging reviews with a pass/fail system for the test because I wanted to be able to see in hard stats how many movies I see that either meet or fail to meet these basic requirements.
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