London (2006)

Knee-jerk reactionaries will undoubtedly hate Hunter Richards' London. Self-important, over-written character pieces in which scraggly-beautiful twentysomethings snort decadent amounts of cocaine in palatial Manhattan lofts -- well, movies like this are not always received with open arms, especially by audiences bracing themselves against pretentious indie twaddle. This is not to say London isn't usually best described in these terms; it's a film whose surface-level posturing can be irksome. However, Richards' debut feature does manage to be more than that on occasion, almost enough to be worthy of a flier for fans of Jason Statham or an underused Jessica Biel. For one, it's nice to see Chris Evans abandon his pretty boy image from The Fantastic Four to probe the inner frustrations of a wastoid whose problems are largely of his own creation. He and Statham have some good moments of honest dialogue about the mistakes they've made -- in between their copious nosefuls of blow. Statham himself is in familiar territory, having forged a career from roles in which it looks like he might explode into violence at any moment. But his character's key revelation undercuts that assumption as well. Richards' dialogue is what ultimately hamstrings the movie -- for every sharp, relevant observation he introduces into the discourse, there are three left-field bits of pontification about God and the universe. It's too much strain for one small movie in which very little happens. London is best suited as a salve for viewers in the operatic throes of being dumped, who want to vicariously agonize with Evans over minute failings that might have played out differently. But even they might find Evans a little too combustible to identify with. ~ Derek Armstrong, All Movie Guide