Harry Brown

HARRY BROWN is a revenge thriller poised somewhere between DEATH WISH and GRAN TORINO. Michael Caine plays an old man with a dying wife. He lives in a London housing estate used by a drug gang as its own turf. Pedestrians are terrorized and beaten, drugs are openly sold, there are some areas understood as no-go. From his high window, Harry hears a car alarm and looks down to see the car's owner come out and be beaten by thugs. This is the daily reality. Michael Caine is a subtle actor who builds characters from the inside out. His voice has become so familiar over the years, that it’s an old friend. In this film, he begins as a lonely, sad geezer, and gradually an earlier persona emerges, that of a British marine who served in northern Ireland. All of that has been put in a box and locked away, he says, and thinks. (Roger Ebert)