Despite the very mixed opinions on Fracture the casting was very promising, which was reason enough to check it out. After watching, Fracture had a lot to recommend but didn't fully live up to its potential.

Fracture does have a lot of good qualities or so I thought. It's very stylishly filmed with some unusual but well-done camera angles and eye popping colours. The music score is suitably understated and suspenseful, the script is clever and sharp with some intelligent dialogue in the courtroom scenes and the story has its diverting parts with the courtroom drama entertaining and suspenseful and the twist is interesting. It's well directed and the cast were great and lived up to their potential. Anthony Hopkins' accent is inconsistent but he's still chillingly commanding and Ryan Gosling is equally very good in a very polar opposite role. Their cat and mouse chemistry provide a lot of the film's entertainment. Embeth Davidtz, Billy Burke and David Strathiarn acquit themselves very well too and Fiona Shaw stands out as a sharp-tongued, dry-witted judge.

Wasn't crazy about Rosamund Pike here, she looks great and is a talented actress with a number of good performances under her belt, but while she makes a real effort to give off a cool-as-ice authority I found her character to be pointless and very indecisively written. The story has its fair share of good parts but it is also majorly flawed, it does get complicated and ridiculously preposterous complete with a thrown-in and unnecessary romantic subplot and an ending that has too many loose ends. The pacing can be absorbing but can have a tendency to drag and unfortunately when it does it does so badly. Overall, entertaining and well-made with a good cast who give impressive performances but very problematic in the story department, which is a shame. 6/10 Bethany Cox

I will always try to see anything with Sir Anthony Hopkins and Ryan Gosling in it, their names at the top of the billing for Fractured guaranteed me plunking down ticket money. Although in this case I used an earned pass at the Regal Cinema.

I did enjoy the playing of both of these guys in a very improbable tale of a man who kills his wife and then is arrested for the murder in what seems an open and shut case.

And for the audience it is open and shut because we know right at the beginning Hopkins did it. The story is how he manipulates the system and the people working in it for his own ends.

Hopkins's wife is having an affair with homicide detective Billy Burke and we know that also right at the beginning. Unfortunately the problem in this film is that the plot is predicated on Hopkins KNOWING that Billy Burke will be the investigating detective on the scene when the crime is called in.

Still Hopkins and Ryan Gosling as the preoccupied District Attorney who is looking to make a career move and not giving the Hopkins case the attention it deserves turn in a pair of fine performances. My favorite in the film however is Billy Burke as the tragic detective in the story.

Recommended for fans of Anthony Hopkins and Ryan Gosling.

Willy Beachum (Ryan Gosling) is a slick prosecutor on his way out to bigger and better things in the private sector. For his last case, brilliant wealthy Ted Crawford (Anthony Hopkins) has killed his wife. He seems to be unbalanced as he demands to represent himself. It looks to be an open and shut case. That is until the gun they got isn't actually the murder weapon, and worst of all, the arresting officer was having an affair with the wife.

Ryan Gosling is effective as a slick young gun who got caught with his pants down. Anthony Hopkins is doing a variation of Hannibal Lecture. He's less cannibal but all the same just as smart. It's nice to see them face off. Some of the actors overplay their roles especially detective Flores (Cliff Curtis). While I get why everybody has to be against Willy, it does make it seem oversimplified.