Fracture

Fracture is one of the smarter crime dramas I've watched in awhile, but let's give credit where it's due and I will never tire of Anthony Hopkins. What is it about this guy that makes him so thoroughly... creepy? No other actor comes to mind that can make the hair on the back of my neck stand up while sitting shackled in a chair. As his most terrifying scenes in Silence of the Lambs were spent sparring with Clarice in that position, his best work in this film is toying with Ryan Gosling. Hopkins has the chilling smile and dead eyes of the psychopath down cold. duh.

Ted Crawford (Hopkins) shoots his cheating wife in the head. Willie Beachum (Gosling) is the smug, up and coming prosecutor who wrongly assumes that nailing Crawford for attempted murder (wifey is a cabbage) will be the last slam dunk of his DA career before he's off to a lucrative position in a major law firm. But Crawford is a fracture engineer and way smarter than you or Mr. Fancypants DA and he's going to get away with it... and Willie is going to have to make the tough choice of that big money job or letting the bastard walk.

Gosling is going to be around for awhile. He more than handles sharing the screen with Sir Anthony and that's saying a bunch. Director Gregory Hoblit (Primal Fear) builds the game and the tension between his players nicely. Anthony Hopkins is ... creepy. You may figure this one out before the hapless hero, but not ten minutes into it, so it's entertaining to the end. Check out the above average website here.