MYSTIC RIVER
(Fri 5th-Thurs 11th / 7pm / £4/3)
(Clint Eastwood / 2003 / USA / 137 mins / 15 cert)
Starring: Sean Pean, Tim Robbins, Kevin Bacon

Three of Hollywood's best male leads act their skin off portraying three childhood friends who grow up to be a detective (Bacon), ex-con shop owner (Penn) and maladjusted adult (Robbins). They suddenly find themslves thrown together when a horrific murder befalls Sean Penn's daughter in their old working class neighbourhood. All three have a dramtic incident with a kiddie molester lurking in their past and this air of unease haunts the film. The investigation into the murder is a catalyst for them all to look long and hard at their lives, lives full of violence, lost love, regret and forboding destiny, brillantly interwoven within the probing script. The tensions mounts as all three find themselves pushing each other into positions that are bound to end in trouble...

This is cinema that pins you to the seat from the start, a magnificent, complex, thrilling high drama story told with unflinching nerve and brutally handsome grace. It is one of the most gripping, moving and finely tuned films of the year and hoists Clint Eastwood into the master film maker category. This work has the deep resonance of Once Upon A Time In America, the paranoid tension of Dirty Harry and the emotional intelligence now sadly missing in most big films...and this is a big film.