Edge of Darkness

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Edge of Darkness  

Mel Gibson returns to the front of the camera for the first time in 7 years to star in Martin Campbells conversion from TV to Movie version of the 80’s drama Edge of Darkness.  The story follows cop Tom Craven, whose daughter is brutally slain on his doorste after she comes for a surprise visit.  At first Tom is believed the intended victim but after a few anomalies come to light it seems that his daughter was embroiled in a cover up operation involving the Government and a local nuclear powerplant.  His quest for answers are sometimes helped and sometimes hindered along the way by the mysterious Darius Jedbah (Ray Winstone) reaching an inevitable violent climax as the shocking truth strarts to come to the surface.

In what is Mel Gibsons first acting job in 7 years you think he would have gone all out with a full on action pic or comedy, but what he chooses here is the film that tries hard but ultimately fails as it repeadtledy is it’s own undoing with some ghastly plot devices, scripting and denoument.  Mel Gibson delivers an accent which sounds like Mickey Rooney for the most part, his cop on the edge is nothing more than a collision of Mad Max and Martin Riggs from Lethal Weapon.  Ray Winstone is no better, woefully out of his depth in a role that was originally intended for Robert De Niro, he is the weakest link showing up at the most inopportune moments and doesn’t add anything to the overall plot.  The insistence on doing deep voice talking (made famous by Christian Bale in the Batman films) to sound scary is borderline ridiculous.

The direction however is strong enough to hold the weak movie together.  It should be as Martin Campbell has been through this story once before as previously mentioned he directed the original TV series.  As with these remakesthe action has been  relocated to America, which doesn't necessarily add anything, maybe a bit more realism as you can imagine this kind of underhanded type of behaviour happening.  Overall this is a sub par thriller featuring a bunch of characters you don’t care about.  So when the ending creeps in  you will know there is only one way it is going to turn out considering the people Tom is up against.

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