 |
| Review by Benn Robbins |
Locke is a brilliant film.
Shot, for the most part, entirely in a BMW SUV on the M25 motor way in the UK and starring Tom Hardy.
Locke is basically a one-man play about a man who has the life and family. He is dedicated to the building and construction of grand structures and has meticulously crafted the world around himself the same way one would build a skyscraper.
After a phone call, on the night before one of his most important concrete pours for the UK’s tallest building his world begins to crumble around him. He spends the entire film on the road trying to get to a fateful destination that will forever change the direction of his life.
Locke is another in a very long line of films showcasing just how brilliant an actor Tom Hardy really is.
From the very real struggle of spending 8 days, nine hours a night alone in a car on the highway shooting the film to the filmic struggle of receiving and making a litany of phone calls from colleagues and loved ones and having to react to only a voice over a speaker, Hardy, truly shows you a man who is having one of the most difficult days in his life.
I was riveted for the entire 85 minutes of this film and not only did I feel for Hardy, but I truly felt sympathy and anger for his wife, Katrina (played perfectly by Ruth Wilson), his scatter-brained but loyal colleague Donal (Andrew Scott, known for his amazing Moriarty in the BBC show Sherlock) and Bethan (beautifully played by Olivia Colman best known for her roles in Hot Fuzz and Doctor Who) as the catalyst for Ivan Locke (Hardy) to make this unfortunately timed trip to London.
It is a great testament to the writing of this film that not only do we feel every emotion of Ivan Locke as his world unravels but that we really feel for these disembodied voices that we hear over the crappy car speakers on his cell phone. From the utter disbelief of his boss and colleague to the upheaval of his wife and children’s world when it is revealed what and why Locke has seemingly up and abandoned his life and family.
Writer and director Steven Knight (writer of the visceral and critically acclaimed Eastern Promises and Dirty Pretty Things) has created a world and slowly demolishes it around Locke. What makes this hardest to watch is that, Locke, is ultimately doing the right thing but in doing so he is sacrificing the family and work he loves more than anything. It is the struggle of a man faced with a moralistic “rock and a hard place”.
Along with the terrific writing and acting, the direction and cinematography are perfectly crafted to make you feel the monotony and sometimes tunnel vision-esque of a long nights drive, coupled with what is happening to Locke throughout the film the shallow focus and blurred headlights and speeding by street lights heighten the disorientation of the viewer right along with Locke as he makes his journey to London to “right a wrong”.
I love films that take the “one-man-play” or “two person play” idea and interpret it for film, whether they are adapted from actual plays or are original ideas. The idea of having an actor or actress on screen for a whole film and carry the film with just themselves is just amazing, to me, when it is pulled off well. It shows me that they are capable of creating and being a believable character that you sympathize and root for. I knew, from his previous body of work, that Hardy was capable of this but he really, really blew me away in ways I didn’t expect.
It was refreshing to just watch him act.
If you are looking for a brilliant film to go see with phenomenal acting, I can not recommend Locke enough.
