Fracture
By Cory Peynado, Blockbuster.co.uk

“If you look close enough, you'll find everyone has a weak spot”

Ryan Gosling constantly impresses me. He is a complete representation of new leading man talent. Fresh faced, young, and relentlessly hardworking, I struggle to think of any picture he’s done that I didn’t enjoy. What I do notice looking back at some of his earlier work is that he prefers a more challenging role than the traditional hero or nice guy, and what could be more challenging than battling the flesh eater himself…Anthony Hopkins.

Going into this with the subjective view that it would merely be a courtroom drama I was quite surprised as it progressed. Hopkins reverts back to the dry and intelligent persona that captured people’s attention in films like Silence of the Lambs and Meet Joe Black, except this time he’s the craftsman of a very articulate jigsaw puzzle that unveils itself throughout the movie, keeping us audience members guessing till the very end.

Intelligent man and husband Ted Crawford ( Anthony Hopkins) is a successful engineer who, over time, has discovered that his wife is cheating on him with another man. After a quick confrontation where he tells her he loves her, up comes the gun and CLICK, his wife is dead, so everything normal so far, but wait…

After hearing that Ted has signed a confession and has freely admitted to killing his wife, Willy Beachum ( Ryan Gosling) jumps onboard as prosecutor, thinking that this will be an open and shut case and hoping that it will give him another little notch on his belt to impress the new company that is showing interest in him.

Willy Beachum: “I'm not going to play any games with you”
Ted Crawford: “I'm afraid you have to old sport”

Things take an unexpected turn when police discover that the gun Ted was holding when arrested has never ever been fired and Ted now claims to have signed the confession under duress. Willy finds himself getting drawn into a battle that proves to be a far more complicated affair, with Ted out smarting him at every step and his shiny new job looking further and further out of reach.

You know those movies that hold your attention so tightly that a train could run through the room and all you would do is raise the volume? Well this is one of them. From the offset the chemistry between the two is absorbing and the mystery of this clever plan is even more engrossing. It’s one of those movies where each actor has been used to play to their own personal and particular strengths. For Ryan it would be the subtle naivety and arrogance of youth while for Hopkins, it would have to be his magnetic on-screen presence.

What I’d also like to do is give a quick mention to the set design team and Director of photography (Listen to me, talking like I know them) as I thought that each shot was beautifully well staged. A quick look around Ted’s Southern California luxury home in the movie and you’ll see what I mean. Showing the immaculate and perfect living area of this man did a great job of personifying how precise and careful he must be and I also think it added a great deal of depth to Ted’s complex character.

At the end of the movie I felt satisfied that the often branded but rarely justified tag - psychological thriller – had actually been earned. It won’t be long before other movies follow suit and try to pull off something just as clever - don’t miss out!