Great cast! Slow beginning! Good action! Perfect ending!

Rating: 9/10 (20 July 2012)

For some reason - and I do still not know why exactly - this movie was not released in cinemas here in Germany but is only available on DVD and Blu-ray which is in my opinion a huge pity. It is a great, a really great movie that, as far as I can tell nearly has everything a great and dramatic movie needs. And yes it is a great and dramatic movie, Maybe not actually a drama but certainly it is not what the German publishers must've thought it is: Just another martial arts fighting movie! It's not at all. Of course they fight in the movie and admittedly it is very well done so they must've put some thought into it but in general it is about the relationship of the two brothers and also their father.
ACTION Scince the movie shows actors performing martial arts (and not vice versa) it is even more impressive that the fighting sequences are so very entertaining. Also they are not overloaded with slow motion sequences like i.e. Guy Ritchie's 'Sherlock Holmes'.
CAST Great actors actually performing great acting. Nick Nolte ahead of all others grumbling madly and rather impressively, Tom Hardy especially in the end with both superb acting and fighting and Joel Edgerton as a financially struggling physics teacher (Both astonishingly good as a teacher and loving but troubled husband and also as a ex-fighter trying to get back into the game).
SOUNDTRACK Great soundtrack from Beethoven's ninth symphony to a great final song giving the ending the perfect touch.
PLOT Well thought out plot story convincingly telling the story of those two brothers and their seriously compromised relationship.
FLAWS (SPOILERS) Aside from the (at first) too slowly told story (which later picks up speed after all) I can only report the minor that the back story of Tommy Conlon regarding his past with the army and him deserting his unit, while saving a couple of other soldiers from a drowning tank fairly unconnected to the rest of the movie. I watched the movie twice now and I am still not really seeing the actual connection to both the plot in general and the emotional past.
GENERAL But all in all a very good and partially very touching movie with an amazing and emotional end.