"MY name is Domino Harvey. I am a bounty hunter."
Tony Scott's fast-paced crime thriller is inspired loosely by the true story of Domino Harvey, the one-time model and privileged daughter of actor Lawrence Harvey and socialite Sophie Wynn, who rebelled against her Beverly Hills lifestyle to become a bounty hunter.
Directed with Scott's trademark brio and stylistic overkill, Domino is a breathlessly paced collision of fact and fiction, which never lets the truth get in the way of a neat plot twist or gratuitous nudity. In the film, we meet bloody and bruised Domino (Keira Knightley) in the aftermath of a botched assignment. FBI criminal psychologist Taryn Miles (Lucy Liu) probes Domino about her connection to bail bondsman Claremont Williams III (Delroy Lindo), and the abduction of some college students.
In a series of fractured flashbacks, Domino recounts her first encounter with ex-con Ed Mosbey (Mickey Rourke) and his sexy Latino compadre Choco (Edgar Ramirez) at a seminar for aspiring bounty hunters.
Joining forces with Ed, Choco and their associate Alf (Rizwan Abbasi), an ex-pat from Afghanistan with a penchant for explosives, Domino becomes one of Los Angeles' most successful and legendary bounty hunters.
Her beauty and poise under fire soon bring Domino to the attention of fanatical television producer Mark Heiss (Christopher Walken), who wants to feature the heavily armed foursome in his new reality show, The Bounty Squad.
With Beverly Hills 90210 hunks Brian Austin Green and Ian Ziering (playing themselves) on board as the hosts, the cameras start rolling. Mark is delighted with the footage of Domino, Ed and Choco shooting and punching their way out of trouble. Little does he realise the trouble that lies ahead when the bounty hunters accept a job from Claremont to track down four youngsters, supposedly responsible for a robbery.
Dedicated to the real Domino Harvey, who died on June 27 this year at the age of 35, Scott's film is a visual grab bag. The director ricochets between different film stocks, colour palettes and filming techniques, establishing a fast and furious pace that rarely slackens. It's eye-popping to say the least and there's always something in Domino to arouse the senses. The camera lingers adoringly on Knightley and Ramirez (she strips to her undies to perform a lap dance, he strips to his briefs for an equally gratuitous Nick Kamen moment in a laundrette). The characters finally consummate their smouldering attraction in a soft focus love scene in the desert that would make a great commercial for a designer fragrance.
Knightley looks too pretty and fragile to convince as a bounty hunter but she seems to be having a ball getting dirty with the boys. Rourke, Ramirez and Abbasi are interesting additions to the mix while Walken explodes with his usual over-the-top theatrics. Kaboom.
See it at UCI, Odeon
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