.: ShaolinTiger - Kung-Fu Geekery :.

The mysterious and charismatic Russian-born Nikolai Luzhin (Viggo Mortensen) is a driver for one of London's most notorious organized crime families of Eastern European origin. The family itself is part of the Vory V Zakone criminal brotherhood.

This is a pretty gritty film, I hadn't actually heard of it - but Suanie recommended it so it must be good! It's got a strong rating of 7.9/10 on IMDB (One of the highest scores I've seen for a while).

The movie revolves around an average British girl (Naomi Watts) getting entangled with the 'Vor V Zakone' AKA the Russian Mafia - a scary bunch at the best of times. There is really quite a number of then in the UK, especially around London and they control a fair amount of territory.

It's pretty gory, violent, sexual and nasty - there's betrayal and all kinds of things going on.

Viggo Mortensen absolutely rocks it as the bad-ass Nikolai. He took method acting to the max, he really becomes Russian, the way he tilts his head when he speaks, his mannerism, everything is fantastic!

Vincent Cassel is also excellent as the narcissistic, confused, violent and down-trodden big-shot mafioso.

After stabbing someone in the eye during a naked fight in a sauna, I have to say Viggo is a real man now!

This is a great movie, an unexpected gem in the rough...definitely a must watch in my books. If you haven't seen it go and find it now and watch it and watch Viggo ROCK IT.

This is a memorable movie, the noirish setting, the vivid characters, great scripting, character development...it has a the lot!

I give it an eye-poking 8.5/10.

Tom Stall, a humble family man and owner of a popular neighborhood restaurant, lives a quiet but fulfilling existence in the Midwest. One night Tom foils a crime at his place of business and, to his chagrin, is plastered all over the news for his heroics. Following this, mysterious people follow the Stalls' every move, concerning Tom more than anyone else. As this situation is confronted, more lurks out over where all these occurrences have stemmed from compromising his marriage, family relationship and the main characters' former relations in the process.

This is not a new movie, it came out in 2005 - I can't say I remember hearing about it at that time. Probably not a highly billed film, I just picked it up recently as it looked interesting.

It scores a very high 7.5/10 on IMDB though, which gives an indication that it should be a decent film.

The movie starts out pretty sharply with some strange characters, interesting dialogue and some extreme violence. In some ways the first few scenes reminded me of Tarantino movies.

The movie progresses from there, leaving you wondering what is going to happen next.

Drama is nicely handled through-out, the pacing is good and Mortensen plays his role very well on both sides of the fence.

Starting out as an accidental hero it leaves you with a feeling something odd is happening, and it plays out from there.

The violence is pretty brutal, like the sex scenes - straight to the point and direct. It also plays on some serious issues like 'good' vs 'bad' violence...how do you decide where the line is?

I won't spoil the movie for you, but I will very much suggest that you do watch it.

A brutal and gripping movie, I give it a nose pounding 8.5/10.