Thanks for checking out our In Bruges review!
The General Idea
Plot synopsis from IMDB: Bruges, the most well-preserved medieval city in the whole of Belgium, is a welcoming destination for travellers from all over the world. But for hit men Ray and Ken, it could be their final destination; a difficult job has resulted in the pair being ordered right before Christmas by their London boss Harry to go and cool their heels in the storybook Flemish city for a couple of weeks. Very much out of place amidst the gothic architecture, canals, and cobbled streets, the two hit men fill their days living the lives of tourists. Ray, still haunted by the bloodshed in London, hates the place, while Ken, even as he keeps a fatherly eye on Ray’s often profanely funny exploits, finds his mind and soul being expanded by the beauty and serenity of the city. But the longer they stay waiting for Harry’s call, the more surreal their experience becomes, as they find themselves in weird encounters with locals, tourists, violent medieval art, a dwarf American actor shooting a European art film, Dutch prostitutes, and a potential romance for Ray in the form of Chloë, who may have some dark secrets of her own. And when the call from Harry does finally come, Ken and Ray’s vacation becomes a life-and-death struggle of darkly comic proportions and surprisingly emotional consequences.
The Good
This is an extremely well written story. Amazing call backs, fantastic tie ins, and an ending that … I would love to discuss, but cannot without giving something away. This is a dialogue heavy film that pits different characters together at different times. In a short amount of time we have in jokes, back stabbing, double crossing, good natured ribbing, enemies becoming friends, friends becoming enemies all the while remaining wildly entertaining. The characters in this film are all interesting, unique and it is a pleasure to see how them mix it up in varying combinations.
The film focuses mainly of the characters Ray (Colin Farrell), Ken (Brendan Gleeson) and “the boss” Harry (Ralph Fiennes). For most of the film we are following Ray and Ken around town, listening in on their discussion. This would normally be insanely boring fare, but Bruges is as beautiful a setting as you could hope for, and the 3 aforementioned heavy weights use language like they had a black belt in it. With words like whips they lash each other back and forth without skipping a beat, it was an absolute pleasure to watch these thespian masters speak with power, emotion and legendary timing.
We witness the “wind down” time of surly assassins and get to share in their post-murder day to day . Usually a film about assassins is all about “the job”; this film picks up where most finish. This was a dark drama, and the comedic moments were an equal shade of space. The theatre was packed and people were laughing throughout the film; well and often. So many of the conversations were packed with jokes, this is common in life, but is rarely done so well in a film. The chat was natural, funny and jam packed with profanity. You swear at work, I swear at work, these gents simply follow suit. The language is irreverent, crass and exactly what you should expect from people that kill others for a living.
The Bad
At 107 minutes I feel this film could have done with a slight trimming. The dialogue never got boring and in fact the film itself didn’t seem to drag, but a more liberal use of the editing shank may have made this just that much more. This however is my only quibble with this however. I have more problems with Mother Theresa than I do with this film.
Overall
I loved this film and could not recommend it enough, if you see one film this weekend – may this be it. I had high hopes for this movie and it did not disappoint in the least, it tickled me in the blackest regions of my heart; and for that, I thank them. Out of 10 I would gladly give this film a 9, and declare it Routh.
oh incase i didnt say twice…. its dark? :D
In Bruges is amazing… funny, heartwarming, dark, deceiving, dark… i cud go on…
watch it a few more times and you see SO MANY things you never noticed the first time round…
also it seems to fly by once you seen it once… best film ive seen in a VERY long time!!
Farrell’s a fuckin legend!!!
loved the movie…finally a movie where Ive been to….made me want to come there again….the language is simple and direct…during the shootout “Ray: My room faces out the canal, right? I’m going to go back to me room, jump into the canal, see if I can swim to the other side and escape.
Harry: All right.” haha….
Power cast plus power performance, some wit and humor in it. Not bad, in fact it was good entertainment. Saw it without dozing off. For the sophisticated only. It won’t matter if you were educated but prefer being an imbecile, then this movie will bore you. But if you use that white matter inside the skull, this movie is not that bad something like a 4 out of 5. 5 being the highest.
The song is called That Time and it’s by Regina Spektor
This movie was pretty awesome. I was very impressed. People rave about Colin Farrell in this, but I thought he was close to ruining it. Late into the movie I warmed up to him though, and the supporting cast is fantastic.
Extremely clever, very self-reflexive, a surprisingly cool movie.
http://staticfix.blogspot.com
Damn this movie rules….best one i’ve seen in years…and a beautiful setting
(Type your comment here. Make sure you’ve read the commenting rules before doing so)does anyone know what the song was that was playing during the make out scene btwn ray and chloe?
Saw In Bruges tonight, man, what a fantastic film. I loved it so much. It was funny, sad, violent and so clever, whats not to love?
Saw it yesterday in Ireland….delighted Farrell got a character to get his teeth into but Brendan Gleeson is brilliant what an actor…see this if you like something to make you think about what is going on rather than having it spelt out for you….best movie I have seen for a long while
Glad you recommended it! I might not have seen it otherwise. The way that Ray kept saying “In fucking BRUGES!” just killed me. Oh God, can’t wait for the DVD.
“They’re filming midgets over there!”
Bwahahahahahahahaaaaaaaa!
Glad you liked it!
I saw this tonight and it was fucking hilarious.
pretty good considering it was fucking filmed in fucking bruges.
Oh and it totally made me want to go to Bruges on vacation. So beautiful.
Saw it over the weekend and really enjoyed it. Superior script that is funny, dark, & soul searching. Rock solid performances from the entire cast. Farrell seems on a roll – he was also good in Cassandra’s Dream. I heard he’s sober these days, maybe he’s just finally in control of his craft.
Routh = “The Total Package”
Its a reference to Superman Returns. Brandon Routh was said to have a massive bulge in the tights when donning the Superman costume. So much so that the makers of the movie felt it necessary to digitally reduce it in post-production. Hence why a movie designated as “Routh” is the “total package”.
A.K.A. – You MUST see this movie.
Doug, this is most definately a stupid question, but in terms of your rating system what does “Routh” mean? Obviously it’s something really good, I’m curious about the choice of words. The “no” and “go” are pretty self explanatory. I wasn’t aware of you guys when you started the site so you probably explained it then. In Bruges does look amazing though.
I personally feel that Colin Ferrel has a lot more potential that hasn’t been tapped yet properly.
The writer/director, Martin McDonagh, wrote one of the funniest and bloodiest plays I’ve ever seen on Broadway–The Lieutenant of Inishmore. Brilliant. And I happened to see the trailer for In Bruges before almost every movie for the past few weeks, so I can’t wait to see it!
I’d heard some buzz for this. Now I’ll put it on my to-see list. Colin was supposed to be the next big thing, but I have yet to see him live up to his hype. Nice to hear that he’s good in this.
i love colin farrell
hey ben,i second your opinion!! by the way where the hell are from anyways? i’m from limburg! nice meeting you!
bert
This movie was amazing. Colin Farrell’s best best role in years, if not the best of his career. I can’t wait til this gets a wide release so I can see it again and again.
I was hoping this movie would rock, a little bit propaganda for our little country Belgium!
I’m looking forward to this movie. I saw the trailer and it looks nice.
Thanks for the review Doug, I’m deffinetly going to see this movie.(When it eventually plays in Belgium.)
Cheerz