Bob (Tom Hardy) doesn’t seem like a criminal. Soft-spoken and retiring, he's a born-and-bred working class Brooklynite and a devout Catholic. Sure, he pours drinks at Cousin Marv’s, a shabby neighborhood dive that serves as a “drop bar” for the Chechen mob. Nonetheless, Bob repeatedly swears, “That’s not me. I just tend bar.” Whether or not this assertion is accurate, aspirational, or delusional is the question at the heart of The Drop, a formidable crime thriller from Belgian director Michaël R. Roskam.
Bob is a streetwise guy, but also a kind-hearted soul. One night he discovers an abused pit bull puppy in a garbage can. The adjacent house's occupant, Nadia (Noomi Rapace), helps him tend to the dog, for which Bob feels an anxious responsibility. He and Nadia bond over the animal, beginning a courteous, guarded friendship. Bob is preoccupied, however, by a recent robbery at the bar, wherein masked men swiped $5,000 in Chechen cash. Unfortunately, Bob and the eponymous Cousin Marv (the late James Gandolfini) are on the hook for the missing money. Soon Bob finds himself shadowed by both a curious police detective and by an unbalanced neighborhood creep with a murderous reputation.
Adapted by crime novelist Dennis Lehane from one of his own stories, The Drop is an engrossing tale of dirty deeds and dirtier secrets. Lean but robust, the film eschews the narrative convolutions that characterize much of Lehane’s work. Instead, it presents a simple scenario fortified by exacting yet subtle performances and by an outstandingly designed urban landscape, all slush and rusting chain link. At the film’s center is the magnetic Hardy, who portrays Bob as a deferential Working Joe boxed in by untenable, remorseless circumstances. The essential thrill of The Drop lies in anticipating how he will wriggle (or smash) his way out.
The Drop opens Friday, September 12 at the Landmark Tivoli Theatre (6350 Delmar, 314-727-7271).
