Layer Cake DVD Review:

It may be an easy way to make money but the drug business is a very precarious and dangerous one. While you may think about yourself as nothing more than a businessman, there are others that see it as a way of gaining power and respect, with no one getting in their way of achieving this. As with all businesses there are different levels of power and when an order comes down from on high, you won’t get fired if you fail, you’ll be killed. Welcome to the Layer Cake.

Producer Matthew Vaughn moves behind the camera and moves into the same territory as his long time collaborator Guy Ritchie, the British crime movie but can he make something very different. The answer is yes.

Moving as far away from Ritchie’s in your face, fast edit, comedic approach as he could possibly get, Vaughn brings us a realistic, stylish look at the criminal underworld and his hieratical structure. This is a gritty, no holds barred approach that shows the life, how you’d imagine it. This is a world populated by powerful men who are consumed by ambition and greed to move higher up the criminal ladder.

At the bottom we have the wannabe’s, the wide-boys looking for that big deal that will set them up and make their names known. The next layer contains the businessmen, the ones who have gained the respect of their peers and are earning a nice, tidy profit. After that is we have the captain’s, the bosses who demand a share of the profits for the goods that they provide. These are the big players, the men who pull a lot of the strings. At the very top we have the crime lords, the ultimate criminal power. These are the men who over see it all, demanding their share of the profits and ruling the roost with power and violence. This is the layer cake of the title.

Matthew Vaughn has gathered together an excellent ensemble cast to portray the differing layers of the criminal cake. The much underrated and always excellent Daniel Craig plays the protagonist of the piece. Acting as both star and narrator, Craig excels in a role that showcases the full range of his skills. This is a character that wants to get out of a business that he sees as very short term. He is very good at what he does, a fact that doesn’t go unnoticed in the echelons of criminal power, so leaving might not be as simple as he thinks. Even though the character is a criminal, Craig makes him very likeable to the point that you actually want him to succeed, even though you shouldn’t.

Jamie Foreman plays the Duke, the type of criminal you’d expect to inhabit the bottom layer. Over barring, loud and starving for power, The Duke is a man with big ideas but hasn’t got the intelligence to realise them. Not with getting himself and his associates higher up the ladder into a lot of trouble. Foreman excels in parts like this, creating characters that are instantly dislikeable.
If you wanted someone to play a British crime lord, you could do no better than the always-superb Michael Gambon. He plays the role with a real zeal, making the character grab your attention from the off, commanding respect. This is a man who you wouldn’t mess with or betray.

The rest of the ensemble is also good. Colm Meaney makes a great, no holds barred henchman. Tamer Hassan proves some comic relief as Daniel Craig’s muscle and Dexter Fletcher shows again that he deserves more chances on the silver screen.
Layer Cake is not the kind of British Gangster movie you might have been expecting from the producer of Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels and Snatch, in fact it shouldn’t even be associated with those films. The movie stands on its own as a gritty and entertaining work, which gives a more truthful insight into the London crime scene. While the story may loose you slightly in the final act, too many plot threads and not enough time to tie them all up, this is still a great example of the genre and a promising start for another talented, British director.

Star Rating = * * * *

PICTURE & SOUND

Presented in Widescreen 2.35:1 Anamorphic with Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtrack, the transfer is extremely good. Bearing in mind that this is an extremely low budget feature ($4 million), the transfer brings out the best in this visual treat. The sound is also good, emphasising the strong dialogue and the fantastic sound rings through every speaker.

BONUS FEATURES

Disc 1

Commentary
Director Matthew Vaughn and writer/producer J.J. Connolly talk about bringing ‘Layer Cake’ to the silver screen. In this chatty and informative track the pair reveal how they wanted to move away from the ‘Cheeky Cockney’ gangster films that Vaughn had produced with director Guy Ritchie and move towards a more gritty, realistic approach. They reveal how they created a stylised look for London on a micro budget and explain the differences between the book and what you see on screen. This is a good commentary from a director/producer that is a shining light for the British film industry.

Disc 2

Deleted Scenes & Alternative Endings (21.56 mins)

With optional commentary by director Matthew Vaughn and writer J.J. Connolly, some of these fifteen deleted scenes would have added to the film but there removal is explained. We see more of the Duke in Amsterdam, a longer version of the meeting with Jimmy, more backstory, more from the police and more of Sienna Miller. You also get to see two alternative endings that where only shot to appease Sony.

Storyboards (4.30 mins)

View storyboard to actual finished shot comparisons for ‘XXXX shoots Jimmy’ and ‘Mr Lucky vs. Dragon’

Featurettes

Promo Featurette (5.52 mins)

Director Matthew Vaughn and stars Daniel Craig, Colm Meaney, Michael Gambon, Jamie Foreman, Sienna Miller and Sally Hawkins take you behind the scenes of ‘Layer Cake’. Highlighting the differences between this and the movies he has produced (Lock, Stock… and Snatch), the featurette reveals the grittier, more realistic side to the story. The actors talk about their characters and what it was like to work with the director on his first movie behind the camera.

NFT Q&A with Daniel Craig and Matthew Vaughn (29.04 mins)
Filmed at the preview screening at the National Film Theatre in London for Time Out Magazine, the Q&A session sees the director and his star answer questions for the magazine and from the audience. We hear about what it was like for Matthew Vaughn to turn from producer into director, staying in a familiar genre, adapting the book and the changes that were made to it, casting, shooting in London, the level of violence and how they achieved so much on such a small budget.

FC/Kahuna Music Video (4.06 mins)

Watch the music video for the ‘chill out’ classic ‘Hayling’ by FC/Kahuna.

Photo Gallery (5.36 mins)

A montage of publicity and behind the scenes images from ‘Layer Cake’

Trailers
Watch the theatrical trailer for Layer Cake and previews of Snatch, The Forgotten, Hitch and xXx: The Next Level

OVERALL

Columbia/Tri Star has done a good job transferring a modern day British classic to DVD. The commentary track is very good and the collection of deleted scenes and featurettes are also good. While the bonus features are of a good standard, it is hard to see why they are spread over two discs, when they could have easily fitted onto one. This aside, fans of the movie will be very happy and it is a great rent for those of you who missed it at the cinema.

DVD Star Rating = * * *

Jamie Kelwick

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