Sexy Beast

The other night I watched Sexy Beast for the first time. (I love you, Netflix!) It was a fantastic film–brilliantly shot, perfect dialogue…The beginning of the film, well, the beginning after the big boulder incident, is all suspense and fear and wonder and waiting. But, about what? About a person the audience has never seen and knows nothing about. But all of these other people are talking about him–Don Logan–and that builds tension.  The stakes are raised pretty damn high before he even arrives; this is done through subtle dialogue, facial expressions, and body language. Gal, Deedee, Aitch, and Jackie sit around being edgy and stressed out, and it works brilliantly. Then Don shows up, and Ben Kingsley turns it all up a few notches.