A remake of the 2008 French film Rivals, this torpid crime thriller set in Brooklyn circa 1974 has – on paper – a knockout cast. It features Clive Owen as a pimp-cum-ex-convict, and Billy Crudup as his cop brother (no, really), orbited by James Caan as their dying dad, Lili Taylor as their sister, Marion Cotillard, Zoe Saldana and Mila Kunis as assorted ex- and current girlfriends, Matthias Schoenaerts as a thug … the list of names just goes on, and the dialect coach must have made a packet coaxing nu-yawk accents out of the cast. But it's all a rebarbative waste of talent, attenuated with reaction shots and redundant bits of business that actor-turned-director Guillaume Canet (who starred in Rivals) clearly couldn't bear to part with. As with many 70s-set films, a cunningly chosen soundtrack featuring the likes of Ace Frehley, Al Wilson and the Isley Brothers attempts to paper over the cracks with cool, but it's not convincing.
Blood Ties review – Clive Owen flexes his Nu Yawk accent in torpid thriller
Clive Owen, and Marion Cotillard and a host of other stars waste their talents in this unconvincing crime thriller set in 1970s Brooklyn, writes Lesley Felperin