150 Word Review: 'The Limey' (1999)
Bide your time
This mournful, dreamlike neo-noir about an English ex-con who stalks the sunny streets of Los Angeles, hunting his daughter’s killer, is one of director Steven Soderbergh’s best.
Terence Stamp is heartbreaking as the title character—an aging predator off his leash. Fresh out of the slammer, he speaks in outdated Cockney rhyming slang, befuddling the Yanks. There’s never a moment when Stamp's face isn’t a portrait of a man haunted by regrets, except for one scene, when it's splattered with someone else’s blood.
Soderbergh edits in scenes from a 1967 movie starring a younger, happier Stamp to hammer home the crushing passage of time.
The Limey preceded 2009's blockbuster Taken, also about a vengeful father with a particular set of skills. The former wasn't a hit. And the Limey can't save his little girl. Peter Fonda is the villain, a slick, soft-spoken scumbag music producer who likes his girlfriends very young.
spot on
Traffic had it's moments and it definitely has some thematic and style connections but the Limey is a smaller (and better) overall movie