Bronson

This is a fantastic depiction of Charles Bronson, born Michael Peterson, Britain's most infamous and notorious prisoner. Director Nicholas Winding Refn invites us into Bronson's imagination, with parts of the film shot from the perspective of him being on stage in front of an adoring audience. The rest of the film is a dramatization of Bronson's life and times in prison.

Bronson was initially incarcerated for seven years for the robbery of a post office where he stole £26.18. However he has spent 34 years in prison and psychiatric wards so far, and is still there, spending 30 of them in solitary confinement. He has been involved in fighting, brawls and hostage taking which led to his increased sentence, and he seems to enjoy it. No lives have been lost.

This is an excellent performance from Tom Hardy –funny, thoroughly engaging and intense. He physically transformed himself for this role and obviously studied Bronson vigorously to accurately portray his mannerisms.

A thoroughly compelling film. A must see!

Can you really produce a biopic about the theatrical brutality of Britain's most dangerous prisoner and not incite comparisons to Kubrick's "A Clockwork Orange?" The trailer for Nicholas Winding Refn's "Bronson" spouts the likeness triumphantly with a quote attributed to Damien McSorley for the publication, "Zoo." Surely Kubrick is a flattering filmmaker to have your humble work compared to, though like American director Wes Anderson, who borrows all the style of the man but none of the content, "Bronson" is a film with an air of grandiosity and very little in the way of actual story. Kubrick's film, based on the novel by Anthony Burgess, has a Dickensian plot that doubles back on characters and scenarios established in the first act, leaving nothing unchanged by the end of the third. It's a comparison under which "Bronson" unfavorably suffers: well directed, impeccably performed, but completely devoid of structure.

I don't mean to undersell the above compliments, however. Tom Hardy as lowly criminal Michael Peterson and his imprisoned superstar alter ego Charles Bronson, displays a remarkable, feral intensity in the role, spitting meaty, cockney chunks of dialogue with a truly disquieting voracity. And Hardy makes a perfect match for Refn: both share a larger- than-life approach to their craft. The director's visual audacity is never more sublimely paired with Hardy's performance than during Bronson's intermittent narrations; snippets of a surreal one-man stage show for some great, unseen audience. The cutaways recall the feel of Alex's presentation following the successful administration of the ludovico technique in "Clockwork Orange." Swooping crane and sweeping dolly shots, along with some fantastic locations, also evoke Kubrick's directorial sentiments, as does the more obvious accompaniment of classical score to key sequences.

Unfortunately, the failure of "Bronson" is not only that there's very little dramatically to be done with a man who spends the better part of his life in solitary confinement, but that beyond a vague notoriety, Peterson's ultimate goal is never particularly clear. The ending of the film is startling in its abruptness given that the scene seems interchangeable with any number of the fights Bronson picks over the course of the film. It doesn't feel a particularly epic brawl, and by that point, the tedium of Bronson's outbursts, battles, and increasingly severe punishments had worn me (though it could maybe be called a statement on the nature of desensitizing cinema--in that respect a reverse "Clockwork Orange") into a sleepy passivity.

The film is nevertheless a step the right direction for the usually-schlocky and hyper- masculine Refn, but "Bronson" still wants for the substantiality that makes great films great films. It isn't likely to inspire any further meditation on its subject beyond perhaps provoking a curiosity about the man himself in those intrigued but unsatisfied with the screenplay's frugal allocation of hard data and social context. But despite the film's inability to make clear its greater thematic intent, I don't think "Bronson" is a perversely violent film or that it exists solely as a fetishistic idol to counterculture, as some will likely label it, and have labeled Kubrick's masterpiece. Its beautiful cinematography (courtesy Larry Smith, interestingly enough, the lighting cameraman for Kubick's own "Eyes Wide Shut") and stellar lead may make it a worthwhile rental next year, but as it stands, "Bronson" is a precautionary tale. It's a film that has everything going for it except the the thing that matters most: its story. And you don't need to be Stanley Kubrick to figure that out.

As I was watching the first 30 minutes of the bio flick "Bronson", I thought it had a death wish or something. It does take a while to let this movie hit you. "Bronson" is based on the true story of who is called England's most notorious prisoner, that would be Michael Peterson better known by his alias Charlie Bronson. He has been incarcerated for 36 years, and 31 in solitary confinement. He never killed anyone, just was convicted of armed robbery a few times; but it was his feisty ways in the prisons and psych wards he did time in that got him all that time. Instead of trying to breakout, Bronson wanted to stay in prison but not exactly as a Solitary Man. He relished on physically brutalizing prison guards and other cellmates, not to mention taking a few as hostages. Bronson also had an artistic side that is also highlighted in Writer-Director's Nicolas Winding Refn movie. Refn's screenplay with Brock Norman Brock did escape the rules of viewer engagement from time to time with its extreme bizarreness, but somehow it boldly & bloody worked. Kudos goes to Refn for orchestrating those power-punching scenes where Charlie B. is refn so many up. Also, I must commend his direction of the comedic scenes of observing Charlie readapting to social civilization upon being released after his first "prison tour of duty". But "Bronson" would not be a brawny feature without the tour-de-performance of Tom Hardy. This Hardy Boy sure did not lack a punch with his dead-ringer Bronson transformation. It will be hard to knock out Hardy as a surefire grand actor for years to come. It is hard to fathom that this is the same actor who played The Cleaner in "Inception", two exemplary performances but diverse in so many ways. "Bronson" is worth putting in the time for no better reason just to witness Tom Hardy's extraordinaire hard work. So pass Go and matchup with "Bronson". ***** Excellent

In one of the most frightening and downright crazy lead turns of the year, Tom Hardy ignites the screen in the British independent film, Bronson. Based on the unbelievable true story and directed by Nicolas Winding Refn, the at times bizarre film tells the story of Michael Peterson, played by Hardy, who robs a post office in 1974, to only get 26 pounds out of the deal, and is sentenced to four years in prison. A four year stay has turned into a thirty-four year prison term, thirty of which has been spent in solitary confinement.

The man, which the British press calls 'the most violent prisoner in Britain," is one of the most complex, and highly disturbing characters to be depicted on screen this year. He always wanted to famous, Hardy states with such charisma at the opening of the film, but he can't sing, he can't dance, so he creates an alter ego during his time as a boxer prior to his prison sentence. Though the film is loosely based on the real man and his story, it doesn't matter, Refn treats the film with such artistic integrity and takes chances that most directors hope to accomplish in their careers. The narrative, though over-whelming at times, is unyielding in the manner in which it's told. For the most part however, Tom Hardy's gritty and aggressive performance will go down as one of the best kept secrets of 2009.

In watching the picture, the co-stars are nearly invisible as Hardy takes control of the screen and your attention. He enables the viewer to devote their time and energy with fear of severe consequences in not doing so. Hardy is an incredible talent and not sure if you'll see a more devoted actor to a character on film this year.

Refn's choice of music that fills the scenes with torment, discomfort, and sheer violence is a brilliance shown in his armor. Bronson is pure entertainment, and though it doesn't provide any moral or social significance in the acts of our lives, it's an admiral effort by British cinema.

***/****

Bronson is the story of a very violent man, a man with clear mental issues that have gained him the infamous title of the most violent criminal in the UK; he is undeserving of attention on the scale this film gives him and the idea that he is somehow pleased with the film or that it has earned him "fame" is something that sat uneasy with me while watching and continues to sit uneasy with me afterwards. Morally I wondered why I came to the film and also why it was made; director Refn certainly doesn't seem bothered by this though and indeed did himself no favours by famously illegally taping the real man's comments on the film for broadcast at the premiere. So with this in mind it is hard to swallow a film that doesn't seems to have a certain apathy towards the central character – not a great choice of word perhaps but, while the film doesn't go as far as admiring Bronson, it certainly doesn't condemn him or present him in a way that will revile an audience.

Having said that though, what Refn seems to have done is created this film where Bronson tells us his own story. This allows for a soft touch (as it is his own) but also for this violently compulsive mind to create and fill the film so that he is equally a larger than life character while also being quite terrifying in his snaps and swings. The result of this approach is not a film that is to be relied on for the facts of the story but it is one that really delivers a quite dizzying film in terms of borrowed styles, impact, violence and sheer over-the top bravado. It is hard to really process because on one hand this was a problem for me but on the other it actually worked very well to produce a film that is as much a monster as its subject – and the kind part of me wants to believe that this was the point.

If it was then it is successful in some way because it is a beast of a film that comes at you violently and persistently. This is not all praise perhaps, but this is what it does. Depending on your point of view, Refn's direction either pays homage or rips off plenty of others as he throws visual styles and flairs at the screen as if he never thought he's make another film. There are countless reference points are in here if you want them, but for sure Clockwork Orange is what he is going for and I suppose in some way the sheer energy with which he goes after it is commendable. It is not his style and it doesn't make you forget the failings in substance, but it is engaging as pure style. Matching him step for step in this regard is an incredibly ballsy performance from Hardy. It is worth noting that I do not think it is great when it comes to character or intelligence but these failings are in the material, not with Hardy – he follows his director and he deserves a lot of credit for not flinching from anything. He is intense but yet flamboyant, disturbed but yet disturbing, a nice bloke but yet a hideous monster – and it is all done with 100% conviction. His Bronson is not a well-crafted character but (rightly or wrongly) he isn't meant to be and Hardy hammers home what he has been given.

Bronson is not an easy watch. For one reason it features strong violence, language and nudity that may put some off, but the much bigger reason for me was the lack of morality within the construct of the story. The lead character is allowed to tell his own story and as he twists it with his ego, so the whole film is twisted by his ego – Bronson as a man doesn't deserve this done on his behalf and it sat uneasy with me. The saving grace though is that the whole thing is excessive and full-on from the director, an approach which in turn draws an intense and bravely excessive performance from Hardy that makes this really worth watching even if it has a lot of problems in it and around it.