This is just bracing and brutal. The kind of film that makes you feel a little uneasy after watching it. It's also fascinating seeing Lumet's cynicism not drop an iota in his twilight years. In fact this film is probably an ode to how versatile and great a director he was, fully embracing digital recording and making something that feels hard nosed and hard edged and surprisingly modern.
Philip Seymour-Hoffman is fantastic, as usual, in this. He's one of these actors who I never think of as being particularly threatening, but he's brought real fury and danger to a whole bunch of roles. I kind of like how believable his trip off the deep end is in this, his screaming rages giving way to something far calmer, at least on the surface. His intensity kind of blows everyone else out of the water and Ethan Hawke doesn't seem to be able to keep up with him at all. It doesn't help that the character is kind of weak in its inception, torn between people who hate him and people who want to use him.
Gotta give some love to the score by Carter Burwell. I love his work with the Coens and whilst this does seem to have a hint of his previous work I kind of love how all encompasing it is. The score in this film almost feels like a part of the character, lurking around the edges.
