Felony
Special Presentation
Director: Matthew Saville
A little known fact about actor Joel Edgerton is that he’s actually quite the accomplished screenwriter. His latest effort (following several shorts and the sadly under-seen in North America Aussie noir The Square) as a scribe and leading man comes in this admirably even keeled cop drama focusing on a trio of detectives with dodgy allegiances to one another.
Edgerton stars as Malcolm, a highly decorated officer working on a high profile drug case, who in a moment of drunken indiscretion drives home and side swipes a kid on an early morning paper route, leaving the kid in a coma. The officers who take the case are a close acquaintance of Mal (Tom Wilkinson) and a young idealist (A Good Day to Die Hard’s Jai Courtney) who wants to probe deeper into the situation than his superior will allow.
Each character in Edgerton’s script has a clear and thoughtful arc, and with Saville’s help they create numerous memorable scenes. All three leads are at the top of their game (especially the always exceptional Wilkinson) and despite the story not feeling particularly fresh as a cover-up drama, there’s more than a enough to enjoy and get caught up in. It’s a minor shame that the film somehow decides to race to a less than thoughtful conclusion, but it doesn’t mar anything that came before it, either.
Screens
Saturday, September 14th, Scotiabank 1, 7:15pm
