Layer Cake **** (2004, Daniel Craig) – Classic Movie Review 660

Another day, another Brit crime thriller, but this one from 2004 is quite a lot better than most. Daniel Craig stars as a drug dealer, who’s made his pile and is planning to quit the cocaine racket. But his mob boss Jimmy Price (Kenneth Cranham) wants him to tidy up a few things first, like find the missing rich daughter of Jimmy’s old pal Eddie Temple (Michael Gambon). And naturally there’s a mountain of drugs and two or three girls (Sienna Miller, Sally Hawkins, Nathalie Lunghi) in the picture. too.

Craig gives a commanding star turn and the very good Brit cast fleshes out its familiar roles. And both they and imaginative director Matthew Vaughn certainly make much out of a rather average, predictable screenplay by J J Connolly. The flashy-looking film-making style works pretty well, too, in Ben V Davis’s striking cinematography.

Debut director Vaughn is the producer of Guy Ritchie’s movies, as well as Mean Machine, so it’s not surprising that this is very much in their vein. Ritchie had planned to direct but was busy. The Bond producers liked what they saw here and cast Craig as their new 007.

Tom Hardy, Colm Meaney, Dexter Fletcher, Jamie Foreman, Tamer Hassan, Jason Flemyng and Ben Whishaw (Q to Craig’s 007 in Casion Royale in 2013) are also in the strong cast.

The title refers to the layers anyone in business goes through in rising to the top. In the penultimate scene at the Stokes country club, Craig and the drug dealers are eating a layer cake.

© Derek Winnert 2014 Classic Movie Review 660

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