Masand's Verdict: Flashbacks of a Fool makes Craig look boring

IT'S NOT WORKING: Even Daniel Craig doesn't succeed in doing much to lift the film.

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Cast: Daniel Craig

Daniel Craig already shows us way more than we'd bargained for in the first five minutes of Flashbacks of a Fool, his latest film, in whose opening credits itself we see Craig enjoying a hedonistic drug-fuelled threesome with two stunning models. Craig plays a washed-up Hollywood movie-star whose life is a reckless whirl of sex, drugs and booze. Evidently he's fallen off the A-list and is having trouble finding work. But just when you thought things couldn't get any worse, he gets a call from his mother informing him that his best friend from childhood just died. That's a cue for him to down some more alcohol and dive into the ocean for a flashback into his youth. The film now cuts to 1970s England where he grew up as a boy at a beachside home with his mother, sister and aunt.

In a sense this is the coming-of-age tale of this teenage boy who we see hanging with his friends, romancing the local cutie, and engaging in an illicit sexual relationship with a married neighbor. This secret affair ends under tragic circumstances; and it's also meant to account for his lack of emotional growth.

Anyway, the film's third act involves Craig's character returning home for the funeral of his friend, where he confronts his past.

Now, despite some remarkable photography and a killer soundtrack, Flashbacks of a Fool is an empty, boring film because -- very simply -- the script fails to arouse any sympathy for its protagonist.

The best scenes in the film take place between Craig's character and the actress who plays his straight-talking housekeeper. I'm reminded of the particularly amusing one in which he urges her to feel a lump in his chest in case it's breast cancer.

Just minutes short of two full hours, the film is too long and too uninteresting to be able to enjoy; even Daniel Craig doesn't succeed in doing much more than showing off his buff physique.

Because of its poor script and the uninspired direction, I'll go with one out of five for Flashbacks of a Fool -- in the end, you can't help wondering if it's the director of this film and not the movie-star character that Craig plays who might be the fool after all.

Rating: 1 / 5 (Poor)