Free Fire

Violence is a common theme in British director Ben Wheatley's brief but noteworthy CV (Kill List, Sightseers, High-Rise), and Free Fire is no different - except that this derivative but fun shoot-'em-up all but dispenses with plot. An illegal guns deal in a dockside warehouse rapidly becomes a trigger-happy free-for-all as personal grudges are aired and gangland scores are settled. Cillian Murphy, Brie Larson, Sharlto Copley and others have little to do apart from scream insults at each other from behind barrels, pillars and vans, in the all-too few quiet moments when reloading their many firearms. As a Tarantino-lite genre exercise it's as good as any, and better than most, if frustratingly amoral with no real distinction between heroes and villains for the viewer to cheer or hiss at. Wheatley brings the noise and the action with verve, although the entire 90 minutes feels like one over-egged final scene that inadvertently got separated from the rest of a film.