The Town: Review

A few years ago, Ben Affleck made his directorial debut with the controversial Gone, Baby, Gone: a taut drama about a missing child. Critics agreed that Affleck was a director to watch. Well now comes his second outing behind the camera but has he lived up to the same level of excellence that he did with his first film? You bet he does.

Set in the town of Charlestown, Boston, notorious for its high level of bank and armoured truck robberies, Affleck leads a gang of crooks who rob a bank dressed as demons. In the process, one of the gang kidnaps the manager and steals her driving licence in order to keep an eye on her. Affleck disapproves and decides to watch her instead, accidentally bumping into her in a laundry, thus beginning a secret relationship. However, with the FBI close on their case and a gangland boss hiding behind the facade of a florist wanting more, Affleck has to decide whether to continue a life of crime, or run away with the woman he is slowly falling for.

Affleck, the director, is starting to show his true colours. He is a film maker who loves characters. Each of his participants have many levels, none more so than his own role, a man with the memory of his mother's disappearance and his father's inability to help find her. His central performance is one of his best, and even though he is on the wrong side of the law, you cannot help but sympathise with him. Brit Rebecca Hall is also superb as the woman he falls for, while Jeremy Renner, so good in The Hurt Locker, is perfect as Affleck's almost brotherly friend and local hood.

The set pieces are handled brilliantly, with each of the robberies as good as the next, leading to a finale that is both gripping and satisfying. It is Affleck's attention to his characters that really wins this film over. He takes time for the audience to fully understand them, with long scenes of dialogue that, surprisingly, never get boring.

It makes such a change to see a film that doesn't rely on cut after cut, taking its time to build and treating its audience like adults, with intelligent writing. This is a heist movie with brains and it wouldn't surprise me if it isn't mentioned in the same breath as some of the great heist movies in the future, even though this is more a human drama.

Affleck was definitely a director to watch after his first effort. With this added to his CV, he could be one of the best directors to come out of Hollywood in a long time.