A little known gem from the BBC's "Screen One" stable of one off feature length movies for TV. This one is about Harry, a compulsive liar, who makes up outlandish but vaguely credible stories for tabloid newspapers. One of his scams is a fake biography called "Confessions of a Hit Man". This leads him into trouble when the publisher (played by Jill Gascoigne, Alfred Molina's real life wife), believes he's ACTUALLY a hit man and hires him to kill her husband. Harry wants to back out but she's also hired two real hit men to help him in their job (one of them played by the always excellent Hywell Bennett). Harry turns to his brother, who works at the Ministry of Defence, and tries to convince him to give him a new, experimental weapon to beat the hit men, but in fact his brother is developing a self-heating tin of soup. Along the way, Harry can't help lying, often for no other reason than he feels like it: His lies start a rumour that his sister-in-law is having an affair, his brother is gay and this in turns leads to the brother being investigated by MI5 (Jack Shepherd playing the agent assigned to the case). The plot, however complex, is wonderful and surprises, twists and entertains. The dialogue has great moments such as "She suffers from Centurion's Syndrome", "Stay with the poof, I'll get the bastard", "Ah, the classic KKI: Kitchen Knife Incident" and "Look out, Lasagne!". Crowning a great little movie is the cast: Molina plays it perfectly, not mugging the camera like Jim Carrey, and with a lot of wit. He's fantastically supported by Jill Gascoigne, Jack Shepherd and Hywell Bennett as well. If you ever see it on DVD or VHS, buy it!
