Risk (2001)
Three people discover jealousy and larceny are a dangerous combination in this tense drama. John (Bryan Brown) is a veteran insurance investigator who succumbs to temptation and veers towards the wrong side of the law. With the help of novice con man Ben (Tom Long), John hatches a scheme to substantiate false claims by taking a percentage of several questionable claims his firm has settled for a fraction of their usual worth. John and Ben are assisted in their illegal business by Louise (Claudia Karvan), a lawyer with a cocaine problem who is also John's lover. But when Louise becomes involved with Ben and demands a bigger share of the money, their already-shaky confidence game begins to collapse.
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Interesting city drama of insurance scam with a reasonable romance added as a diversion RISK offers watchable lanky local dude-actor Tom Long quite a good addition to his CV. Unfortunately it has Bryan Brown doing his usual Aussie slang laden yobbo bloke thing we cinema-goers have suffered through since COCKTAIL. Talking out of the side of his mouth and scowling...so tedious. The gorgeous Claudie Karvan however is the girl and she is always competent and easy to believe..perhaps it is her acting no matter what the material. The other star of this 'quite good' film is the city of Sydney itself and this stab at 'office block business' not often depicted in Australian movies is a fairly successful attempt at a Grisham style thriller. THE FIRM -ish in Sydney? Close. It did not have much of a release and probably looked to possible audiences like a TV movie which is certainly is not.
This film is not the greatest ever made, but it is watchable. I liked the fact that it gave me a bit of an inside look the insurance industry and how it operates. The performances by the three lead actors were satisfactory, nothing brilliant though. Just a note - Guy Pearce was not in the film, it was Tom Long!
Risk is all about the three principals. Guy Pearce is fast becoming one of Hollywoods coming men, Bryan Brown is one of Hollywoods long standing token Australians, while Claudia Karven is not so well known beyond Australia's shores, but locally is a polished regular of Australian film.Pearce makes a wonderfully naive 'bleeding heart' whose presence triggers a long standing scheme of Bryan Brown's, fully at home in the archetypal brash Ozzie male. Claudia Karven plays the other half of the scam, bringing with it the naked ambition that any scam needs to be motivated, and ultimately unravel, as well as bringing significant sexual tension to the plot, which is just one aspect of the developing relationship between the three central characters.The plot itself is nothing new, the combination of spin and setting perhaps is.It suffers slightly from the 'recognizably Australian' syndrome which plagues some Australian films, with Sydney Harbor, and particularly it's famous bridge squeezed into shot, sometimes for no other reason than to show us, hey this is Sydney!The direction works for me, the soundtrack is not intrusive, there's a Porsche featured, which always adds to the looks of a film for me, but also the two younger stars show themselves off attractively for the cameras.But what really drives the film is the clash between Brown's ruthlessness, Karven's ambition, and Pearce's straight man role, all mixed in with a dollop of fear, greed and lust.See it, you'll enjoy.
I just saw this movie at the Toronto Film Festival, And I have to say that this is by far the best movie that i have seen in a long time. The performances by the three key players are dead on, and the direction is flawless. It is just too bad that this movie hasn't found a distributer for North America.