Closed Circuit is a Working Title movie made with great style, good acting and a proper script. No computer special effects needed, no spectacular exploding buildings; simply another example of Stephen Knight at work, and it's up there with Locke. 'A high-profile terrorism case unexpectedly binds together two ex-lovers on the defense team - testing the limits of their loyalties and placing their lives in jeopardy. Director John Crowley does an excellent unpretentious job illuminating this very good plot and script. Eric Bana, new to me, and Rebecca Hall, are convincingly good as the one time lovers. Jim Broadbent, Kenneth Cranham, Ciaran Hinds, Anne-Marie Duff are all excellent. It illustrates how important is the SCRIPT! So many movies do not get this vital ingredient first and foremost. Without credible dialogue you're sunk, no matter who is in it. Rebecca Hall is her usual brilliant subtle self. Nobody in this largely overlooked film is less than very good.

When I waste time like this, I always rush to the "Hated it" reviews to bathe it the warmth of shared derision. But this time MY GOD PEOPLE! no wonder you believe Hillary kills people!? The problem with this movie is not the acting or pacing or cinematography or romance based on home-wrecking. It's the utterly silly setup. For reasons that are unclear the establishment is bent on conducting a show trial, with a culprit/victim who for reasons that are unclear is willing to go along with it, perhaps because his family for reasons that are unclear wants him to. So they manipulate things to assign a couple of compromised defense lawyers to handle the public and in camera portions of the trial. But the lawyers press on so the secret service starts murdering people to avoid some horrifically inept bungling coming to light... Um okay. Turns out 1 in 10 Brits is a member of MI5, so there is no need for CCTV, which doesn't play any part despite the would be eponymous title. This reaches a climax when our heroes must escort a teenage witness to the court. For no reason they seem to think the court is some kind of magic sanctuary... Anyway, this gut wrenching sequence plays out by the protagonists shouting "Hey look over there!" then walking to the courthouse. Where upon MI5 figures out the obvious solution and the movie thankfully ends. Er except for a coda with the lawyers acting like the sluts they are...

CLOSED CIRCUIT is yet another British counter-terrorism movie which focuses on the supposed evils of the Security Service (MI5) rather than on the Islamists they fight. After a bombing in London the terrorist ring-leader is caught and put on trial, only for his defence lawyer to die in mysterious circumstances. A new legal team - one each for the closed and open courts - is brought in but they fail to declare that they've been sleeping together. Inevitably they stumble on a really dumb MI5 conspiracy in which the service, after making a mistake, decides the best thing to do is (spoilers) to murder a bunch of high-profile people in order to cover it up. It's nice to see upper-middle class London depicted but the characters are unsympathetic - Bana especially is miscast as a viper-tongue, divorced lawyer - and the plot is stupid; MI5 simply do not run around assassinating people and to suggest that they do is irresponsible because it adds more fuel to the usual idiotic conspiracy theories that circulate. If you want to know what's really going on then read the 7/7 Report.

It's a fine movie. I personally liked the portrayal of the hardships we experience on providing due process when the facts involve terrorism - I don't know why, but people seem to forget they too deserve a fair trial for their actions. It also gives the viewer a glimpse of the mechanisms of a judiciary system. I liked the very fact that this time, the judge is not the bad guy stomping on the truth with his power. He was trying to get the facts and reach a reasonable decision, he was trying to serve justice (weren't they all?). In most movies, the power hungry lunatic killing everyone in the name of his secrets is always the judge. That's a very unfair portrayal. Must judges are pretty out of the so-called loop of power sit on their benches just doing their jobs, giving back to their community. Another thing I liked (a lot): it doesn't have a happy ending. It has a human ending, a plausible one. Something we can relate to (and for some, it even fuels up that "I'll save the world" feeling). I found it a good thriller and was very surprised to see it had little to none promotion. We have some many meh flicks these days... And a movie as nice as this one, is kept in the shadows. Go figure. The acting is delicious - Bana held his own as a Brit! Congrats. And it felt soooooooo good to see the Queen again. Anne-Marie Duff is always a sight to sore eyes on screen (and till this day I secretly wish she was in Game of Thrones or played the very last Doctor on BBC, that would be marvelous). Julia Stiles felt a bit underused here. I wish she was more like Denzel on "The Pelican Brief". Rebecca Hall and Jim Broadbent, as always, impeccable. And did anyone see little Bran here? Isaac H. Wright is Bana's son - the cinematography is AWESOME, the story feels well written and tight, the pacing keeps you on your edge. I enjoyed the flick very much.