David MacKenzie directed the very enjoyable Relay last year. He follows that up with another thriller, starring Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Theo James, Gugu Mbatha-Raw, and Sam Worthington. An unexploded WWII bomb is discovered on a busy construction site in the centre of London. Chaos ensues as the military and police begin a mass evacuation before it explodes.
During the first hour or so, I thought I was watching one of the films of the year. With MacKenzie’s assured depiction of the police and army working together to evacuate the area and diffuse the bomb, it worked as a brilliantly tense procedural, and ticking clock thriller, heightened by Tony Doogan’s score.
The story then changes direction, the focus moving to a bank robbery that is taking place whilst using the bomb as cover. Whilst it still was reasonably compelling, it felt more like a story I had seen many times before. It had increasingly outlandish twists and a flashback that added nothing.
However, Taylor-Johnson is believable as the troubled army officer entrusted with diffusing the bomb and Worthington suitably intense as one of the bank robbers.
Rating: 7.5 out of 10