City Of Tiny Lights Review: Riz Ahmed and Billie Piper star in modern London Noir

Director: Pete Travis (Dredd, Vantage Point)

Cast: Riz Ahmed, Billie Piper, Cush Jumbo, Roshan Seth, James Floyd, Hannah Rae, Antonio Aakeel, Vincent Regan, Danny Webb, Branko Tomovic, Damson Idris

Rating: 15

Running Time: 110 minutes

Release Date: 07/04/2017

 

Meet Tommy Akhtar (Riz Ahmed): cricket fan, devoted son and deadbeat private eye. He has an office above a suburban cab firm, a taste for cigarettes and booze and a finely tuned moral compass well hidden behind a sharp line in cynicism. Tommy walks in one morning to find highclass prostitute Melody (Cush Jumbo) seeking his help, but he soon discovers a dead Pakistani businessman rather than her friend Natasha. Before long Tommy finds himself on a journey that takes him beneath the complex layers of modern London, confronting secrets alarmingly close to home…

Set in West London, gritty thriller City Of Tiny Lights is co-written by author Patrick Neate, and based on his novel of the same name. It is a unique portrait of contemporary London as a teeming multicultural metropolis where nothing is as it seems.

The noir crime thriller borrows elements from old Philip Marlowe mysteries and other traditonal detective crime dramas while at the same time exploring some very contemporary British topics: property scams, the tensions between the police and the Muslim community, the fear of terrorism, the divide between haves and have-nots, and the sheer richness and diversity of multicultural London life. It's beautifully shot with very atmospheric images that capture a visiually stunning modern London.

However, what starts as a great story with a great premise morphs into something very complex and slightly derails from the actual storyline. There are many flashbacks with Tommy as a teenager with his love interest Shirley which are distracting and take a away the tension of the main narrative. And while the flashbacks could have easily made for another movie, Travis underused many of his great actors in this film. Ahmed is a wonderful actor, no doubt about that, and he is in almost every shot, though it would have helped the story to explore more the other characters around him as well.

 

Following its world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival and UK premiere at the London Film Festival, CITY OF TINY LIGHTS will release in UK cinemas on April 7, 2017, courtesy of Icon Film Distribution.