High Life

Anyone under the impression that crime pays should watch Gary Yates's latest feature, High Life. Timothy Olyphant plays Dick, a down-on-his-luck morphine addict and hospital orderly whose job gives him convenient access to his poison. Early in the film, he's reunited with his old buddy Bug (Stephen Eric McIntyre), who's fresh out of a stint in prison. After Bug helps to get Dick fired, the two hatch a drug-addled plan to grab enough money to allow them to live on easy street forever.

Their heist involves ripping off an ATM on a Friday, the thought being that then the machine will be packed with loads of cash. The best part, Dick surmises, is that no one will have to get shot or die. But plans never go quite as expected, and these unruly thugs soon find themselves embroiled in a shootout that leads to a chase when they steal an armoured truck during the exchange of gunfire.

Written by Lee MacDougall (based on his hit stage play), this bitterly funny film shows the depths to which people will sink. Commencing with a frenetic and zany opening-credit sequence, High Life has a frantic energy to it that doesn't let up. Yates has cast his film perfectly, from Olyphant and McIntyre to Joe Anderson as the high-strung thief Donnie, and Rossif Sutherland as Billy, the sexy accomplice who's included in the heist plans primarily because of his way with the ladies.

Yates's artful gear shifting between violence and humour emanating from the stupid acts of his characters creates a kind of comedy of agony. There's something truly painful in watching such a hapless gang of losers stumble and fall, bungling their pipe dream of getting filthy rich. With its retro soundtrack and fatalistic look at the not-so-quiet desperation of these violent lives, High Life evokes Scorsese at his very best.

Matthew Hays