It's no definitive masterpiece but it's damn close.

Fun premise, good actors, bad writing. This film seemed to have potential at the beginning but it quickly devolves into a trite action film. Ultimately it's very boring.

This story has more twists and turns than a second-rate soap opera.

Funny, strange, confrontational and subversive, this is one of the most interesting experiences you'll have at the cinema this year.

If one looks at each British gangster film as a cup of tea, Mike Hodges's I'll Sleep When I'm Dead is the stale leaves left at the bottom, void of any kind of robustness. I don't mean that in a bad way, as it's a very well made film, but it's also bleak, bitter and populated by characters whose lives have derailed into ditches branching off from what their lives used to be. A shaggy, unkempt Clive Owen plays Will Graham, a former gangster who has relegated himself into obscurity, dwelling in a caravan situated in a rural forest, and peeing into milk jugs. For whatever reason, he's a ghost of his former self and would have it remain that way. Life (and the necessities of plot) has a funny way of turning plans on their head, though. Will has a brash, cocky younger brother (Jonathan Rhys Meyers), an upstart hoodlum who peddles pharmaceuticals at shitty nite clubs and fancies himself top dog. One night he's kidnapped, sodomizes (yes you read that right) and set free, after which, consumed by the trauma, he takes his own life. The perpetrator is a shady automobile tycoon named Boad (Malcolm McDowell) whose reasons for such a nasty and frankly odd act aren't revealed till the third act. Will forced out of recluse and heads to London to rendezvous with his former pal (Jamie Foreman) as well as an old acquaintance (Charlotte Rampling). Owen brings a tired, worn out presence that sometimes flares up with the violent resolve his character no doubt used to have. McDowell steals the show in a role that's really a tough one to get your head around, for both audience and actor. He's actor twisted guy who has committed a heinous act, and Malcolm is kind of a go to guy for creeps and villains. And yet.. in the blistering final confrontation, he lucidly lays down his logic with unnerving gravitas, sticking it to anyone that was expecting his performance to fall back on perverse theatrics (this ain't no clockwork orange). It's and wonderful final scene given the time to breathe and play out before the inevitable violence happens. As far as crime films go, this one trades in energy and attitude for a frayed narrative in which the lines of good and evil are slightly maimed to shed light on humans with the capacity for both in equal measures, and often all at once.

I adore Clive Owen, and if his name is on a movie, I'll watch it. Maybe not after this, though.I'll Sleep When I'm Dead is from 2003. Directed by Mike Hodges, the cast includes Owen, Malcolm McDowell, Jonathan Rhys-Meyers, Sylvia Syms, Jamie Foreman, and Charlotte Rampling. Great cast assembled for a slow, sickening movie.Clive Owen plays Will, an ex-gangster now living hand to mouth in a van (but we aren't told why), when he learns that his brother Davey has committed suicide in London. He comes home to find out why. He learns that Davey was raped and killed himself as a result. He is determined to extract revenge.The question is whether or not Will returns to his old life, which is answered at the end of the film. The end of the movie is ambiguous, but if you read the explanations here on the message board, you'll see logical explanations. I just didn't want to watch it five more times.Besides being uninvolved, the reason for the attack on Davey made no sense to me. Such a violent, debasing act, and for that reason? The script could have made that much stronger by first of all, showing us more of McDowell's character, and giving him a compelling reason to take Davey down, such as that Davey was encroaching on his territory or something. Most of the characters were too sketchy to give us any real insight into them.As far as I'm concerned, the best performances were by Jamie Foreman as one of Davey's friends, and Sylvia Syms as his landlady.Clive Owen and Charlotte Rampling underplayed to the point of being comatose. Their scenes together were better than Ambien. I blame the director for this; Owen is a very good actor.If someone got something out of this film, I'm happy for them. For me it was an unpleasant way to spend an evening.

When I realised that this was a remake of Mike Hodges own "Get Carter", I couldn't help making comparisons. "I'll Sleep When I'm Dead" is surprisingly slower but drugs and male rape raise the nastiness ante, despite the fact that "Get Carter" was one of most violent films of the 1970's.A problem in making a crime drama these days is the sheer amount of competition from brilliant, movie length crime series and one-off dramas on television – British ones such as "Lewis", "Wallander", "DCI Banks" and "Vera", and "Jesse Stone" from the US. Interesting plots, characters with depth, and great locations, they have set the bar high.A precursor to them all was "Get Carter". Although Michael Caine's Jack Carter was definitely on the other side of the law, the film featured real locations and characters whose faces revealed their backgrounds before a word was spoken. Although well made, "I'll Sleep When I'm Dead"comes too late to add much to the genre.In "I'll Sleep When I'm Dead", Clive Owen's Will Graham returns from a long absence to visit his brother, Davey. He discovers that Davey committed suicide after being brutally sodomised by a sadistic gangster. Will, a former criminal hardman, has been working as a logger in the country. He lives in his van and has no wish to return to his former life of crime. However, he seeks revenge for his brother and causes a disturbance amongst his former criminal associates.Both films have a strong sense of journey. In "Get Carter" Jack Carter travels from London to Newcastle on the train and then drives through narrow, grim looking streets to attend his brother's funeral. Will Graham travels to London in his van through forests, tunnels and nighttime streets. Both Carter and Graham are violent men, but in Will Graham's case, this is established more by reputation; he only kills one person in "I'll Sleep When I'm Dead", while Jack Carter's body count in "Get Carter" is significantly higher.A big difference between the two films is the underlying humour Michael Caine brought to his role. In a scene at a racetrack, Jack Carter intimidates an old adversary, Eric Paice, played by Ian Hendry. "Still got your sense of humour", Eric sarcastically observes. Carter replies straight-faced, "Yes, I have always retained that Eric". It's an observation that Eric makes twice; the last time is just before Carter clubs him to death. There are no exchanges like that in "I'll Sleep When I'm Dead", Clive Owen is far more serious; his Will Graham is more introspective than Jack Carter, and he doesn't do humour, black or otherwise.Charlotte Rampling plays an old flame of Will's. Even in her late 50's she still brings her enigmatic quality to the film – she never has to do much to make an impression.Both films end on an ambiguous note although "I'll Sleep When I'm Dead" takes ambiguity to a new level. While "Get Carter" ends along the lines of live by the sword, die by the sword, "I'll Sleep When I'm Dead" leaves us completely up in the air. It's a far less satisfying ending, annoying really, because after a slow start the movie does gets you in – a resolution would have been nice.

First and foremost, this kind of crime drama is not for today's Transformers or Twilight-bred audiences. It's way too slow, way too depressing, way too sparse and way too revisionist or modernist. That is the reason why so many people rejected this film and why is it so darn underrated, for sure. If you are here for to see gun plays, neon lights, hyper-stylized images, fast pacing, skip it!Mike Hodges contributed to gangster cinema a lot. 'I'll Sleep When I'm Dead' is like a spiritual remake of his 'Get Carter'. Showing reserved antiheroes, family revenge and a bitter return to forsaken lands, it's just seemingly a rip-off. Back in '71, Carter gave us an insightful look into a depraved industrial community from which morality is long gone, and the protagonist is as just as rotten and just as a scum as his preys - Michael Caine's enforcer is even shocked by his immorality in a place where people are sex toys or disposable objects and they can be killed in the blink of an eye. That film harshly criticized how British films were made at that time and the country's official politics as a genre piece. Well, looking at 'Dead', it's a more existential film. It's about grief "for a life wasted": I mean, the duration of the movie is 80% about how to process shame and pain in our inner life. The character of Will Graham (he's not the Thomas Harris character - by the way, Clive Owen plays him even better than he played Jack in the Hodges-directed 'Croupier') is strictly about this. Like a modernist loner. Maybe he will find an answer for WHY his brother killed himself, but what comes after this realization? "Not much." So he always will be lost, just like a modern hero. We know from the first moment that his crusade is a self- destructive one, and it has two reasons. One: When he lives as a woodcutter in the woods, he's just a shell of a man. That's his new, self-dedicated life. But it's a dead-end street. Two: He need to return to a London where his ex-friends have no noble codes to live by at all. Young hoodlums who beat up the rival gangster's bodyguard to prove themselves they're tough guys. They did it for showing off, not for showing a potential. Will immediately knew it. That's why he stated he would return to his old life. And the realization about Davey: he was a pampered scum indeed. He tried to look cooler than he really is. And yet, the scene when he ends his life, is just shocking. It's filmed in long shots, in blood-curdling slow fashion, just naturally - that's why we feel so bad when Mickser finds his carcass and starts shrieking. As if our room were cold and we felt the blade cutting through our throat. Davey was a petty criminal, but the way he is humiliated is just sickening - because Boad (Malcolm McDowell's first sensible role since say... 30 years)destroyed with what he showed off: his manhood. Maybe that's why we're terrified by that scene. So, it's a losing game for Will. Because even if he finds out the truth, that's only pain left. Lives - wasted forever. That's what the psychologist says. His words burn slowly. And Will drinks for the first time for three years. A silent breakdown. Tragically terrific. Most of the time, Hodges used crime dramas (or his pretty good subversive sci-fi, The Terminal Man penned by Chrichton) to show us alienated guys. In 'Dead', the camera is just like a TV camera: engineered, simple. Even the editing is stuck around in the '70s British flare, this film is not modern at all visually. But this slow pacing tells us that everything has been written, and that's fatality. Just some gunshots, no over-the-top violence: there's only one pervert scene, the desexualization of Davey. Filming it objectively from a single angle makes it more disturbing. 'I'll Sleep When I'm Dead' is not for mainstream boys and girls. It's a great homage to European crime films of the '60s and the '70s. A fact which could be welcomed for cult viewers. Partly lyrical, partly minimalist as hell. Highly recommended!