In 1971 Michael Caine starred in the cult British gangster flick ‘Get Carter’. In the film Caine plays Jack Carter a Londoner who travels to the North of England to try to discover the circumstances of his brother’s death. Carter’s mission takes him into the bleak, uncompromising and seedy underworld of Newcastle’s gangland. On discovering the suspicious circumstances of his brother’s death Carter is hell bent on revenge. It’s an early ‘tour de force’ for Caine who displays his trademark calm, understated yet perfectly measured portrayals. Lesser actors have tried to imitate it in Brit gangster flicks over the years but come up woefully short.

Thirty eight years later and Caine is back playing Harry Brown. The setting is just as un-salubrious in the way of a grim South London council estate overrun with young thugs and locals living in fear of violence. When the widowed ex-serviceman Brown stumbles on to the mindless death of his close friend he sees the only way to set the record straight is by fighting fire with fire.

 The declining years have seen Caine lose none of his ‘Carter cool’ as his puts in a thoroughly first rate performance effortlessly merging the mild natured senior citizen with calculating revenge seeker.

Caine’s excellent performance aside, the movie warrants serious attention. Director Daniel Barber superbly frames the action to great cinematic effect. Just as in Get Carter which used inventive filming techniques like unusual and imaginative perspectives adding to its edgy-ness Barber shows his similar versatility and adeptness.

Right from the opening scene the movie grabs your attention with the action filmed by a kid on a mobile phone riding a bike and shooting indiscriminately before finally gunning down a mother pushing a pram. It’s a highly charged and unsettling intro mixing adrenaline fuelled high jinks with moral outrage inducing reactions at every loud gunfire shot and growing reality of the appalling acts.

 The mundane everyday existence of Brown’s life is lovingly rendered with seemingly personal glimpses into the lives of lonely pensioners and of coping with death of a partner. Caine’s lack of histrionics and Barber’s attention to domestic minutiae add a naturalistic verve that is hard to fault. When we see Brown anguish over taking a short cut or peering through the curtains at mindless violence it invokes empathy. 

The later stages of the film are no less impressive as a sense of urgency is injected as Brown heads towards a final showdown and a late twist to the proceedings. All against a backdrop of violent clashes that evoke memories of not too distant real riots of the past. 

 Given its subject matter the film will invariably be dissected for debates surrounding opinions on ‘broken society’.  Of course it would be disingenuous to suggest that violent vigilantes is the way forward, remembering that is only a film, but it does pose some questions and put forward thoughtful observations, that which maybe nothing new, are thought provoking nether less. When Emily Mortimer’s cop Frampton says ‘Harry it’s not Northern Ireland you know?’ He responds by saying ‘I know but at least they were fighting for something to them out there it’s just entertainment’. Later Frampton tells Brown that he was right to tell his friend to go to the police. “And what did you lot do… nothing” barks Brown. The inept ‘zero tolerance’ heavy handed old school police approach is also called into question as more incitement and conducive to an escalation of conflict. Mortimer’s character who at first glances appears to be a woolly, jobs-worth can later be viewed as a better alternative with local police working closely with communities rather than the corporate high echelons dealing in soundbites and talking tough. The thugs are portrayed as criminals who ‘know their rights’ and use them to taunt the police. Greater liberties for criminals, meaningless numerous cautions for offenders and a lack of trust in the police are still today leaving some communities living in fear.

The movie follows the trials and tribulations of Larry Gopnick (Michael Stuhlbarg) a physics teacher in the 1960s. Gopnick is trying desperately hard to make sense of a life that is rapidly testing not only his resolve but his faith. At home his wife wants to leave him for an smarmy acquaintance, his oddball high maintenance brother who is living with him is getting into all types of scrapes, his son seems to only be interested in TV and smoking pot, his daughter is obsessed with getting a nose job and his attractive neighbour is taunting him by sunbathing nude in the garden. At work his hopes of tenure are being apparently sabotaged by a mystery letter writer and one of his students tries to bribe and then sue him for defamation.

You can’t accuse the Coen brothers of not making interesting, entertaining or funny movies and A Serious Man is another film to add to that growing repertoire. The black humour that undercuts the movie is amusing without adhering to being too esoteric or knowing. The tone and direction of the film is subtly endearing as a portrayal of just an average man’s existence of which given the darkly comedic circumstances is no less an achievement. But then the best of the Coens work always seems to be grounded in a sense of the mundane and of attributing motivations for characters even in the face of the sometimes outlandish. In A Serious Man Gopnick is facing existential angst of epic proportions as he tries to find meaning for what he has to cope with and ultimately a way to put things right.

The film is seen as the Coens most personal work to date as they have drawn on their experiences of a Jewish upbringing in a small Midwest town. It will arguably be more cogent to people who know that kind of world and appeal to die-hard Coen fans but although it has its moments and its humorous subtexts it kind of drifts off aimlessly towards the latter stage.

Waugh is the soothsayer who last month declared that David Milliband had replaced Tony Blair in the running for the new EU foreign affairs job. Just over a week later and Waugh reported in the Standard that actually Milliband was never in the running for the job. Waugh conceded that at a press conference Prime Minister Gordon Brown said that “David Milliband was never a candidate for the job. Britain has only one candidate for the European council positions. That candidate is Tony Blair for the presidency.”

The new news, sorry gossip, from Waugh is that Milliband actually turned down the job because he is planning a future bid for the PM job. According to Waugh’s spooky powers of deduction Milliband rejection of the top EU job, a job we are now told he was never really seriously in the running for, was so he can concentrate on a leadership bid.

Waugh’s printed ramblings are just another example of media speculation surrounding Milliband and the EU presidency job. He was far from on his own as a host of other newspapers talked up Milliband for the presidency and at the same time downplayed Blair’s chances. The ever on the ball Daily Mail even reported that Gordon Brown was ‘secretly backing’ Milliband.

All seems like a concerted press campaign against the possibility of Blair landing the EU post.