I found a $20 bill today … in a parking lot … surrounded by two other parking lots. There’s nothing quite like the guilt-free finding of an amount of money worth finding. And yet, this was not the highlight of my day. You see, I get pleasantly surprised by film about once every six months, if that. When you see as many films as I do, getting surprised is a rarity. Pleasantly? Even more so. So when my standard triple-header ended with a film starring an actor I don’t especially like (Colin Farrell) in a genre I don’t especially like (mobster games), well, I expected to be entertained at a two-star level, like most of Colin’s films. Wow, was I ever wrong.
Hitman/enforcer/bodyguard Victor (Farrell) and Beatrice (Noomi Rapace) are neighbors of a sort. While their 18th story apartments don’t abut, they both live in the same high rise and have close-ish balcony views of one-another. They exchange glances and shy waves. Beatrice lives with her mother (Isabelle Huppert) who encourages the scarred girl to make friends. She takes the plunge; he accepts. Over dinner, we learn that the scars marring the left side of her face are the result of a car accident. Beatrice believes her career as a beautician has come to an abrupt halt. She’s still very pretty, but flawed. Will lonely Victor see past that? The conversation is a little forced, just as many first dates are, and she pushes a nice moment into inviting him for a ride-along surprise. The guessing game is playful. When his truck stops in a residential neighborhood and he questions, Beatrice points out a middle-aged man in a window and IDs him as the drunk driver who scarred her. He was the one who took her joy, her life. And she wants Victor to kill him. Oh, btw, she knows what Vic did last 
summer and ain’t afraid to spill.
Holy crap. This film turned on a dime, didn’t it?
Noomi Rapace delivers her blackmail with such intensity and desperation we are all taken aback. Victor pulls a gun on her; he doesn’t quite know what else to do. She encourages him to pull the trigger. One way or another, there will be a murder. Not just a mob revenge hit. A murder.
A weird dynamic follows in which Vic spends a great deal more time with Beatrice, and her mother thinks it’s romance while we know better … or do we? Meanwhile, Vic has a dark past of his own. We don’t quite know his relationship to mob boss Alphonse (Terrence Howard). He saves Alphonse by clipping a pair of hitters in the first fifteen minutes, but is there more to Vic then being a Grade A flunkee? And all of the mob action results from mysterious piecemeal messages putting Alphonse on edge.
And, oh yeah, Vic is keeping an Albanian man hostage in the hull of an abandoned ship.
The style of Dead Man Down is the kind where after the film you turn to ask the person next to you, “why did he do that?” But you won’t need to. You’ll understand what motivates Vic, Alphonse, Beatrice and the pack of Albanians. And you might even like the results. God knows I’ve never really rooted for Colin Farrell before now.
Mob tool Vic is more than he seems
Cross neighbor Bea has lost all her dreams
Ugly revenge makes this sad story dance
But the romance is that which gives it a chance
Rated R, 110 Minutes
D: Niels Arden Oplev
W: J.H. Wyman
Genre: Scarred special friends
Type of person most likely to enjoy this film: Believers in revenge; believers in repentance
Type of person least likely to enjoy this film: Albanians
