Chopper (Andrew Dominik, 2000)

Mark Brandon 'Chopper' Read, career recidivist and ultra-violent sociopath, has become a folk hero of sorts in Australia for his decades of war against various gangland foes, largely in chokey, and parallel self-aggrandisement which have led him to best-selling status with his autobiographies.
Not unlike Jacques Mesrine in France, then, but with the crucial differences that Read's murder and mayhem was mostly only directed at other criminals, and that he's still around, making the transition to 'a bit of a character' all the easier. Hence it's not startling that Dominik's slice of biopic casts Eric Bana, a stand-up comedian prior to the film, in an overly sympathetic portrayal of the unrepentant thug. And Bana invests the role with such charisma that there's no choice to outright rejection of this hero-worship but to be swept along by a witty script that sidesteps a lot of cliches of the prison film genre. The comic tone still leaves a nasty aftertaste, though.

6/10