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The start of Fracture is pretty compelling and sets the tone for what promises to be a high-class thriller. Ted Crawford (Anthony Hopkins) shoots his wife in the head after discovering she's having an affair, and then freely admits it as soon as the police turn up. Young lawyer Willy Beachum (Ryan Gosling) takes on the seemingly open-and-shut case, but, as this is a movie, it turns out to be far more complicated than it first appeared. Anthony Hopkins looks like he has a lot of fun playing a mischievous character with a murderous streak, and some of his comments in the courtroom are highly entertaining. Of course, Hopkins made his name playing Hannibal Lecter, and while the characters are quite far removed from each other, there is still some resemblance - despite their horrific deeds both characters are strangely likeable. Hopkins fails to convince with his American accent (slipping into Irish a couple of times) but his performance is enjoyable enough for it to not matter. Ryan Gosling has been receiving plaudits lately, not to mention an Oscar nomination, for his performance in Half Nelson, and while this more mainstream role is comparatively unchallenging, I still found that he was successful as the central character. Unfortunately, however, the film does tend to get bogged down slightly when Hopkins is off screen.
The root of the problem in my view is that for a courtroom-based thriller, the plot just isn't intricate or complex enough. There are a couple of twists but nothing earth-shattering, and Gosling's climactic revelation proved to be something that he should have thought of earlier. Former Bond girl Rosamund Pike occupies the love interest role, and while her character is no typical blonde bimbo, her subplot doesn't go anywhere and she only seems to be in the film to fill up the female character quota. Therefore Fracture doesn't manage to maintain the high quality of the first act, but the faults I've identified do not completely spoil it. They just mean that instead of being a gripping drama, it is simply a mildly diverting one given a sprinkling of extra class by Sir Anthony.
The summary
Fracture doesn't quite grip like it should but some well-written dialogue and Hopkins' enjoyable performance spice things up to an acceptable level.
