A brave thought provoking and brilliantly scripted film

Rating: 9/10 (14 July 2006)

A dazzlingly intelligent movie combining a thought provoking and clever script with first class acting, and an amoral anti-hero who you cannot help but love. The fact that no US studios would back the movie makes it a brave choice for Cage, Hawke and Leto, and they all put in excellent performances, particularly Cage as the laconic, self-deluded arms dealer. This movie does not deal in the normal Hollywood black and white morality, but in the thousand grey shades of real life. The movie presents a thought-provoking look at the men who buy and sell arms to the world's dictators and bush-fire conflicts. This is a brave movie that doesn't shy away from showing the reality of the darker side of the modern world. A brilliant, and intelligent movie with superb acting and incisive characterisation, with the possible exception of Hawke's somewhat one-dimensional, crusading Interpol agent (though in fairness he does the best he can with the slim pickings the role offers). To cap it all, the director has given this film has the best opening credit sequence of any movie since Hitchcock.