Hilarious and dark

Rating: 9/10 (24 April 2008)

Crikey there's a lot of swearing this movie. Not that it's a bad thing, but you do wonder how it'll go down in the states where people are a little less familiar with the word "c**t" being used like punctuation.
If you're not a sensitive soul who abhors such sweary behavior you'll love this though, because it's fantastic. The trailers would have you believe it's a madcap jape, when in reality it's dark as hell but shot through with a brilliantly judged jet-black humor that makes it a pretty unique watch. It's not often a film this sombre will have you rolling in the aisles, and it's a tricky thing to do right, but "In Bruges" nails it seemingly effortlessly.
It also looks beautiful, what with the location being pretty damn gorgeous and Colin Farrell (despite popular opinion) is a great actor when he's given a decent script to flex his muscles with. If there's any justice people will cotton on to this and forget "SWAT" ever existed.
It only starts to dip ever so slightly with the appearance of Ralph Fiennes, but that's just because you're having such a good time watching Colin Farrell drink, snort and insult his way around Bruges that you almost forget there's a plot, so when it appears it feels almost intrusive.
That feeling doesn't last long though, such is the film's deft balancing of tone, meaning that even once the laughs give way to the more serious stuff, you're invested sufficiently in the characters that the finale packs a hell of a punch, rounding off a brilliant experience and one of the best films you're likely to see this year.