Film Review: The Jacket

The Jacket
Dir. John Maybury

Reviewed by Matt Adcock


Keira Knightley is carving out a great CV when it comes to delivering ‘films that Matt has enjoyed’ … The Hole was great (and she showed off her perky, um, assets), Pirates of the Caribbean was fun, she stole all her scenes in King Arthur and blew me away in Pride & Prejudice. Next up she has Domino by Tony Scott who is one of my favourite directors and here we have The Jacket… which I just caught on DVD.


Described by the movie rev Chris Curtis as “a dark and brooding film with great cinematography” this is a superb thriller mixes time-travel, mystery, romance, menace and anti-psychotic drugs to compelling effect…
Adrien Brody is Jack Starks, basically a guy who gets killed in the first Gulf War, brought back only to be locked up for supposedly killing a police officer. Deemed a nutter by the judge he is shipped off to a medical facility for the criminally insane – a place so bleak that it makes the one from One Flew Over The Cuckoos Nest look like a 5 star hotel. Deranged Dr. Becker (Kris Kristofferson) starts drugging the crap out of him and locking him in THE JACKET and putting him in a morgue draw for hours on end. But it’s not so bad because whilst in there he ‘travels’ to the future and meets Keira Knightley (as I have done on several occasions whilst strapped down in my under stairs cupboard – but that’s another matter entirely!). The bad news for Jack is that although he gets to sleep with Keira he finds out that he’s actually dead by now – 2007… So, he tries to find out how he died and only has 4 days to do so…
Darkmatt Rating: ööööö (Excellent Freakiness)

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"Errm, hello? Can I take The Jacket off now please?"