by MATTHEW HAYS

The Brits certainly know how to do memorable gangster features. Given a low budget and some ingenuity, the former rulers of the world give great thug, from The Long Good Friday to Sexy Beast.

In Layer Cake, director Matthew Vaughn (who co-produced the noteworthy Guy Ritchie features Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels and Snatch) competently adapts the J.J. Connolly novel for the big screen. Daniel Craig (an actor shortlisted to replace Pierce Brosnan when he decides to resign as 007) plays XXXX, a man never identified but who is the central protagonist. As in Sexy Beast, he’s a man intent on getting out of the nasty Brit gangster underworld, dead set on leaving behind the sleaze and murder of his business.

As the cinematic screenwriting rulebook would have it, retirement from the gangster biz is never so easy. The gangster with no name is drawn back by the threats of his former boss and the lure of game pussy (Sienna Miller). XXXX is then caught in a labyrinth of murder and more murder, with people getting shot right, left and centre. Making things somewhat unique is that XXXX is a gangster with a conscience, seemingly genuinely disturbed after rubbing out a life.

Thankfully, Vaughn avoids the visual gimmickry that ran throughout every frame of Ritchie’s first two features. Rather, he emphasizes the great acting and allows the gorgeous cinematography to captivate us. There is a good solid story in Connolly’s novel, and Vaughn recognizes that he doesn’t need a lot of tricks to detract from it.

As a pleasing diversion, Layer Cake does work. Having said that, for a film like this to really succeed, it needs something to set it aside, given that gangster movies are such well-trodden turf. This one doesn’t quite make the mark. Vaughn gets the grade for competence and effort, but, try as he might, Layer Cake is no Sexy Beast nor a Long Good Friday. It is well told, well acted and suitably shot. It is good, but by no means great.

Layer Cake opens Friday, July 8

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