Animal Kingdom: Review By harveycritic

ANIMAL KINGDOM

Sony Pictures Classics

Reviewed for MovieWeb by Harvey Karten

Grade: B+

Directed By: David Michôd

Written By: David Michôd

Cast: Ben Mendelsohn, Jacki Weaver Guy Pearce, Luke Ford, Joel Edgerton, Sullivan Stapleton, James Frecheville

Screened at: Review 1, NYC, 7/29/10

Opens: August 13, 2010

After that year (2008) in which a typical portfolio in U.S. stocks lost from 30% to 50%, it's a pleasure to hear that you can make more money in securities than you can in the profession of armed robbery. We learn that from David Michôd's "Animal Kingdom," a look at the Melbourne underworld featuring corrupt cops, skuzzy criminals, and at least one honest detective. On the other hand, the movie reinforces the idea that the greeting "We'll treat you like family" is a pleasure you'd be smart to do without, at least in terms of one dysfunctional unit that's anchored by a horny grandmother whose hobby is to kiss her sons on the lips.

"Animal Kingdom" is an intelligent policer whose principal character is a seventeen-year-old who is anything but the wild kind we see here in the States. If he's sullen throughout, he has a reason to be. His mother dies from a heroin overdose, he moves in with his grandmother Smurf (Jacki Weaver) and his uncles, and he's taken in by the magnetism of two of those people who would not fit the definition of "avuncular" as the term is usually used. Michôd, who wrote the script as well as directing it, knows how to pump up the tension, though the tale only in some parts becomes visceral in the style of "Bonnie and Clyde" or this year's "Mesrine."

Adam Arkapaw films the dysfunctional unit in and around Australia's second city, Melbourne, which appears to have people who might rarely say "g'day" and mean it. One guy, Barry 'Baz' Brown (Joel Edgerton), the handsomest of the uncles, is the fellow who tells his evil brother Pope Cody (Ben Mendelsohn) that he's looking for a way out; that the stock market pays more than armed robbery, presumably if you're not a client of Bernie Madoff, our own unarmed robber. Sadly, this born-again chap meets a poor end, resulting in Pope's determination to get revenge against the police. And when you kill a cop, watch out: the force will not be with you.

This is why Nathan Leckie (Guy Pearce), a senior cop, takes on the job of convincing young J Cody (James Frecheville) to testify against his uncles, particularly Pope, who himself is on the run from a team of renegade police who want him dead. The psychological play between detective and teen forms the intellectual segment of the film, a cat-and-mouse game that finds young J taking the admonition "Anything you say can be used against you" literally and refusing to give even his name to the handsome and concerned Leckie.

Michôd's side characters are each distinct, from Nicky (Laura Wheelwright), the addicted bimbo who is J's girlfriend, to Darren (Luke Ford), a generally passive guy who'd like to get out but has no idea how to function without his family. James Frecheville turns in a credible performance as the 17-year-old in his first feature-length movie, Guy Pearce oozes professionalism and determination as the senior cop, and count on two people whose roles could turn anyone's stomach: Ben Mendelsohn as Pope, particularly when he drugs and asphyxiates a character for allegedly talking to the cops, and Jacki Weaver as the mother to the Cody boys who not only acts seductive with them but whose evil is effectively covered up by her outward show of naïveté.

Unrated. 112 minutes. © 2010 by Harvey Karten Member: NY Film Critics