The Limey (DVD)

THE LIMEY Steven Soderbergh’s a strange one. Not only is his surname a real pain to spell, but after winning the Palme D’or in 1989 for the acclaimed Sex, Lies and Videotape he virtually disappeared from the movie scene for near enough a decade. Although a few minor art house films of little note were produced here and there it did little to stop many from asking, “where’s Wally”? To much surprise the red and white-striped jumper-wearing director returned in 1998 and achieved what few other director’s have managed to accomplish – a decent performance from J’Lo, in the wonderful Out of Sight. Trading in his independent roots for the blockbuster scene, the likes ...  Read the complete review

Soderburgh's penchant for timetwisting, overlapping dialogue onto scenes of still mouths, splicing in flashbacks and forwards (as demonstrated in The Underneath and Out of Sight) here reaches a level of subtlety and skill verging on genius, the look of the film throughout and the emotional pictures built up by the editing techniques are truly quite amazing. The characters too all have interesting back-story and quirks, the plot though simple works well and throws a lot of new ideas at a tale that had nearly been done to death since Get Carter etc. Nearly a great film then, but what happened with Stamp? Great actor yeah, trying to portray a man cut off in ...  Read the complete review

Stephen Soderburgh's straight up story telling technique, (shown to great effect in 'Out of Sight' and more recently in the , surprisingly watchable 'Erin Brokavitch') was dropped in favour of a more stylised narrative with annoying flashback sequences. I couldn't help thinking "stop being pretentious" and feel that the flashbacks and jumping point of view camera work actually detracted from an otherwise reasonable revenge film. Terence Stamp's cockney gangster was unconvincing and a little wooden. In comparison his co-stars were great with the exception of the target of his revenge who was dire - stilted, two dimensional and ...  Read the complete review

Sometimes a film fails to be as good as the sum of it's parts and this is true for 'The Limey'. With Terrence Stamp starring and hogging 90% of the screen time and Oscar winning director Steven Soderbergh at the helm you could be forgiven for assuming the end product would be at least half decent. Sadly, for me and my £3 rental, ' The Limey' failed to entertain on any level. The film concerns a man's quest for vengeance over the death of his daughter. After serving a stretch for stealing the Wembley gate receipts for a Pink Floyd concert (who's ever paid cash at the gate for a concert?) he jets to L.A. to confront those he feels are responsible. Using only a ...  Read the complete review

Well I could just tell you about the film and mention that the dvd has extras but that sort of opinion belongs in the film section and not the dvd section. Steven Soderbergh recently won the Oscar for best director. This was for his drug opus Traffic which has a very gritty style and wasn't at all a glossy hollywood product. The Limey is a film in this style, it's a throwback the the cool stylised films of the 60's with the shade wearing icons who raced cars and drove motorcycles in the free america. Soderburgh acknowledges this in the casting with Terence Stamp, Peter Fonda and Barry Newman. For those not familiar with the story then ...  Read the complete review