Serious cinema

Rating: Null/10 (26 October 2003)

This is an actors' film - no special effects, no car chases, no set piece speeches, just challenging roles for serious actors with an intelligent script. It is no coincidence, therefore, that the producer and director is Clint Eastwood who has so much experience of acting as well as directing.

Eastwood has taken a script based on a novel by Dennis Lehane and crafted it into an intense tale of trauma and retribution. The compelling central performances come from Kevin Bacon, Sean Penn and Tim Robbins - who were childhood friends in working-class Boston before an incident changed their lives forever - but they are ably supported by Lawrence Fishburne, Laura Linney and Marcia Gay Harden who bear witness to the consequences a generation later of those awful few days.