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Fracture (2007)

Here is a big, handsome shyster of a legal thriller, pleading with the viewer to stick with its preposterous twists and turns on the guarantee that the crowning revelation will blow our socks off. In this, as in all things, the film is not to be trusted. I was similarly suspicious of Anthony Hopkins, who appears to have hit on the bizarre idea of crossing Hannibal Lecter with a leprechaun. He plays an Oirish-American sociopath who concocts the "perfect crime" and then twinkles merrily in the dock, winking at the judge as the case collapses around him. The courtroom scenes are a broad burlesque. Outraged witnesses hurl themselves over tables and hotshot prosecutor Ryan Gosling (in his second film of the week) is entirely at a loss. All of which is enjoyably silly. It's just that the longer the film goes on, the more dull and pedestrian it becomes. Gosling's eureka moment is the final nail in the coffin, a threadbare little conjuring trick that makes a mockery of all that's gone before.