High jinks and low expectations (High Heels And Low Lifes (DVD))

Member Name: utero

Product:	High Heels And Low Lifes (DVD)
Date:	19/07/01 (51 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: some good laughs, great british cast

Disadvantages: a bit lightweight, seen it all before

High Heels and Lowlifes is set in London so obviously it has criminals and crime as it's main plot. However unlike the wave of bad british crime films we've had to endure in the last year this film actually has a good cast and decent laughs.

Minnie Driver plays Shannon, a hospital nurse who's burned out in her job. Her american friend is a struggling actress Frances (Mary McCormack). One night they overhear a gang robbing a bank thanks to a modern artist boyfriend and one totally inept young criminal. Instead of turning a blind eye they try to blackmail the robbers into getting some of the big loot that has been stolen. Naturally things don't go to plan and soon they find themsleves up against an old pro criminal and have two detectives on their tale.

The film is directed by Mel Smith and he manages to make this an entertaining if somewhat lightweight affair. The two leads work well together and have some witty banter. But it's the criminal element and the detectives who steal the best scenes. The Fast Shows Mark Williams and veteran of several fcomedy shows Kevin Eldon play the two detectives who are pretty clueless and one seems more interested in property prices than his work. Kevin McNally plays the lead criminal and he's a nasty piece of work but is foiled by the ladies and let down by the young dumb new boy (Danny Dyer). All the time he has his boss Kerrigan (Micheal Gambon) breathing down his neck. Gambin is pretty funny as a gay crime lord. At one point he says he has an image to uphold, this is a man who has absurd coifurred hair and long manicured fingernails.

The laughs are constant throughout but moments you'll laugh at loud with. It use London quite well as a location and some credit must be given for building a solid cast of british talent, McCormack aside. But as I said before it's nothing really new and there isn't much to it. It also ends in a very silly way.

Still the term '
;chick flick' can be used as a femail audience seems to the film's target judging by the Tv ads' Still guys should have a good time but I don't know why they decided to open this against Jurassic Park 3.

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