Criminal
2016 · United States · 109 min
- Director
- Ariel Vromen
- Screenplay
- Douglas S. Cook, David Weisberg
- Producer
- Christa Campbell, Boaz Davidson, Lati Grobman, Chris Bender, Mark Gill
- Music
- Brian Tyler
- Cinematography
- Dana Gonzales
Cast
What it is about
Former industrialist turned anarchist Xavier Heimdahl wants a hacker's program that could bypass the codes protecting the world's nuclear arsenals. The hacker, known as the Dutchman, goes into hiding, and CIA agent Bill Pope tries to keep him safe, only to be captured and killed before revealing the location. Desperate, his superiors turn to an experimental procedure that can transfer a dead person's memories into a living brain. The subject is Jerico Stewart, a convict with severe frontal lobe damage and a violent temperament. The film follows Jerico as he attempts to retrace Pope's steps while living with memories that are not his own.
How it was made
The project began in 2013, when Millennium Films acquired a script by Douglas Cook and David Weisberg about a dead CIA operative's memories and skills being implanted into a dangerous criminal. Ariel Vromen was set to direct in September of that year. The cast brought together Kevin Costner, Gary Oldman and Tommy Lee Jones, who were reuniting after JFK (1991), along with Ryan Reynolds, Gal Gadot, Antje Traue and Jordi Mollà. Principal photography began on September 4, 2014, in London, with shoots in Yateley, Croydon and the University of London's library. A cleanroom was installed in east London for the operating-room scene, and aerial drones filmed a car chase there.
Reception and legacy
The film received generally negative reviews from critics and was a financial disappointment, grossing about $38.8 million against a $31.5 million budget. It was released in the United States on April 15, 2016. Despite its strong cast, critics regarded it as a conventional action thriller, and its memory-transfer premise is remembered more as an example of low-budget science fiction than as a landmark of the espionage genre.
Stills
Trailer
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Trivia
Three veterans reunited
Costner, Oldman and Tommy Lee Jones were working together again after JFK (1991), their previous collaboration.
A cleanroom in London
For the operating-room scene, a cleanroom was installed on Surrey Quays Road in east London.
More films by Ariel Vromen
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