City of Ghosts

Matt Dillon co-authored, directed and starred in this medium-budget drama- thriller about a front-man (Dillon) and a con-man (Caan) connected by more than just an apprenticeship. The directing is very good, and the finished product is mostly polished and well paced. The acting is superb, with Caan, Dillon, Depardieu and Kem Sereyvuth giving memorable performances. The story line is also good, though not structurally original, and the script only fails in a few places. Part of the problem with the script may come from the fact that Dillon attempted to pack so much material into it - simultaneously making the protagonist a fully realized and sympathetic character and causing some important plot points such as those illustrating the developing romance between Dillon and McElhone to appear as little more than distracting loose threads.

Dillon and Caan have been working together since Dillon was nine years old. Both are con-artists pulling off elaborate insurance and development schemes, and Caan is Dillon's mentor. After one of these schemes goes bad, Dillon flees the US to try to find Caan in P'Nom Phen, Cambodia, where most of the story takes place. Just as Dillon manages to catch up with his mentor, things start to go much much worse, and the audience is caught in a shell game, wondering, to the end, who is conning who and how bad it might really get. All throughout this, Dillon's character is explored, developed, and grown into somebody markedly different from who he was at the beginning of the film. And the film ends up as much a character study as a thriller.

Some will likely find the lazy pace of this film grating. Others will be annoyed by the dialog-driven plot and the frequent pastiches of strangely alienating Cambodian scenery. This is a film which fits squarely in the independent art film tradition, and so, it won't appeal to most Hollywood action and crime drama fans. For my part, I was mesmerized by the soundtrack and Cambodian imagery, almost to the point that I no longer cared about the plot.

I'll look forward to Mr. Dillon's next film.

City of Ghosts is a exotic mystery that positively oozes atmosphere. The Cambodian setting really amounts to another character in the film, and it's obvious that Matt Dillon has a real love of the country and the people. Dillon's direction and Jim Denault's cinematography do a marvelous job capturing the quirky and sometimes mystical nuances of this part of the world. Little details are woven into the scenes that really reminded me of what it's like to travel there.

Dillon did nearly everything right in tackling his first directing project. He picked an underused and exotic locale, a good production crew, and surrounded himself with top-notch, veteran acting talent. Depardieu, Caan, and especially Skarsgard do a terrific work bringing to life their shady characters. Newcomer Kem Sereyvuth does a nice job playing Dillon's taxi driver/savior Sok. Dillon's character Jimmy, ironically, is probably the least interesting of the bunch. But Dillon as always gets through on his amazing good looks, and has enough acting chops to not embarrass himself. The same can be said for Natascha McElhone who is so gorgeous it doesn't really matter what she's saying anyway.

The film moves at a somewhat slow pace, giving the story and characters lots of time to develop. Occasionally this can be an issue - sometimes time was spent on sequences that didn't contribute much to the final story. For example the opening New York scenes could have been trimmed down quite a bit and nothing would have been lost. But this film is clearly about establishing mood, and on the whole that's exactly what it accomplishes. The mysterious music and long, lingering shots of Asian street and country life are may seem indulgent to some but I thought they worked really well.

The only part of this film that I could take any real issue with was the script. Written in the film noir who-can-you-trust style, I think it would have been better if it had been simplified a bit. Credit Dillon with making the complexities mostly work, but a few less red herrings and a more dramatic final twist would have really elevated the film. However, I enjoyed City Of Ghosts quite a bit, Dillon has distinguished himself and clearly has some interesting directorial work ahead of him if he keeps at it.

If all City of Ghosts was was a travelogue of postwar Cambodia it would be an accomplishment, but it is in its own way a well built film noir in a very unusual, very appropriate setting. Dillon's character goes to Cambodia to collect money from a real estate scam artist. Like the best noirs, what he finds has more to do with who he is than with any money.

Dillon is strong as the stories jaded, soiled hero. James Caan and Stellen Skarsgaard support well as the con men. And Gerard Depardieu provides strong support as a man who has apparently adjusted to living in hell. The movie starts a touch slowly but be patient. It's worth it. There isn't a lot of violence in this movie but what there is is fairly shocking.

Matt Dillon makes his directorial debut with "City of Ghosts", the moody tale of Jimmy Cremmins, a con man seeking redemption in Cambodia. Dillon's was the first film to be shot in Cambodia since the 1960s, and the unfamiliar setting contributes much to the movie's allure. "City of Ghosts" has a remarkable look and feel that lend it resonance and lead one to anticipate Dillon's further outings as a director.

The actors fit nicely into their roles and deliver strong performances. Sereyvuth Kem, a real-life Cambodian cyclo driver, leaves a lasting impression as Jimmy's loyal friend Sok. The film's soundtrack- a heady international collection of pop music mixed with Tyler Bates' evocative score - adds another layer to the already-rich atmosphere. Stick around during the end credits for some of the best exit music in recent memory.

Set in Cambodia a generation after a bloody revolution and civil war, this film follows the adventures of a smalltime crook, Jimmy, who is tracking down an older man responsible for an insurance scam and who has absconded with the money. He arrives in a country full of gangsters and opportunist thieves - not knowing who to trust, he is robbed and beaten up as often as any hero of a film noir movie.

Modern Cambodia is depicted as a hell on Earth - with the exception of a rickshaw driver, Suk, the locals are shown as violent and untrustworthy. Once again a foreign locale is simply a backdrop for white villains to have a shootout. But this doesn't detract too much from a film that is in many ways a homage to "The Third Man", with Phnom Penh standing in for a ruined postwar Vienna, the Harry Lime-equivalent seedy and enigmatic, and the protagonist equally unsympathetic at first. Odd camera angles and flashback shots abound.

The love interest seems tacked on - and a reason for having a female character - but gives Jimmy an incentive to abandon his life of crime and go straight.

An interesting film, worth a look.