Review of The Limey (1999) by David M — 23 Mar 2012

Steven Soderberg proves to be a more interesting director than his conte potsherd like Fincher. Fincher does thrillers like Panic Room and Game and makes them wholly unremarkable. Soderberg does Limey, an homage to the revenge thrillers of the late 60s, and uses an inventive and stylistic approach that adds an introspective layer to the violence, of which most is seen off screen.

He uses two staples of 60s cinema in Fonda and Stamp, and uses the movie as a critique on the idealized agelessness of Hollywood. That people past their prime still trying to be young and crazy and convince themselves they havent lost a step. The story is lean and mean, but the way Soderberg splices in the same images, and has conversations seeming to take place in multiple places at once, gives a unique feel to a tired genre.