CANON
FilmJonathan Glazer, 2000
Sexy Beast
ABOUT THE WORK
The best opening of all time.
“Peaches” by the Stranglers. Ray Winstone’s Gal Dove sunbathing in paradise. A swimming pool, a woman he loves, friends, and the small, mundane adventures of a life he is happy to be living.
Then Ben Kingsley’s Don Logan arrives and begins taking it apart.
Don makes people uncomfortable with themselves. With their relationships, their pasts, and the choices they have made. He finds the ties that give their lives coherence and meaning, then pulls at them until everyone in the room feels exposed.
He is unrelenting. An absolute locomotive of psychological pressure, pushing and pushing until the idea that Gal can simply refuse him becomes impossible.
Kingsley’s performance is extraordinary, and Winstone carries that pressure as best he can. You can see the resignation gathering in Gal. He knows the world Don represents. He survived it once. Now he has a home, security, love, and people whose company he enjoys. Watching that life in danger is painful.
Jonathan Glazer moves the film through joy, dread, mystery, absurdity, and moments of relief that never quite let you relax. You can be laughing and still have that frozen feeling: My God, I hope this ends okay.
The sunshine and the pleasure of the opening give that fear its force. We have seen the life Gal wants. We understand why he wants it. Every intrusion threatens something specific.
I place Sexy Beast in a constellation of British work that opened up a world: Guy Ritchie’s films, Massive Attack’s Blue Lines, and the atmosphere, humor, music, and confidence running through them. Different works, connected in my experience by the excitement of encountering a way of seeing and telling stories that felt newly possible.
Go see Sexy Beast. Watch what happens when Don arrives.
“Peaches” by the Stranglers. Ray Winstone’s Gal Dove sunbathing in paradise. A swimming pool, a woman he loves, friends, and the small, mundane adventures of a life he is happy to be living.
Then Ben Kingsley’s Don Logan arrives and begins taking it apart.
Don makes people uncomfortable with themselves. With their relationships, their pasts, and the choices they have made. He finds the ties that give their lives coherence and meaning, then pulls at them until everyone in the room feels exposed.
He is unrelenting. An absolute locomotive of psychological pressure, pushing and pushing until the idea that Gal can simply refuse him becomes impossible.
Kingsley’s performance is extraordinary, and Winstone carries that pressure as best he can. You can see the resignation gathering in Gal. He knows the world Don represents. He survived it once. Now he has a home, security, love, and people whose company he enjoys. Watching that life in danger is painful.
Jonathan Glazer moves the film through joy, dread, mystery, absurdity, and moments of relief that never quite let you relax. You can be laughing and still have that frozen feeling: My God, I hope this ends okay.
The sunshine and the pleasure of the opening give that fear its force. We have seen the life Gal wants. We understand why he wants it. Every intrusion threatens something specific.
I place Sexy Beast in a constellation of British work that opened up a world: Guy Ritchie’s films, Massive Attack’s Blue Lines, and the atmosphere, humor, music, and confidence running through them. Different works, connected in my experience by the excitement of encountering a way of seeing and telling stories that felt newly possible.
Go see Sexy Beast. Watch what happens when Don arrives.