"We're all terminal."

One of my favorite movies from the first half of 2010 is Mel Gibson's first starring role in quite a few years, "Edge of Darkness," coming from two very promising talents--William Monahan, writer of "The Departed," and Martin Campbell, director of "Casino Royale." While I think many dreaded Gibson returning to the big screen, he actually turns in a very convincing performance in a chilling and ultimately very satisfying film.

The primary reason why I'm focusing on this particular film is that, despite a depth of both plot and character atypical for a first quarter suspense thriller, it's still fairly undiscovered. The movie was given very unfortunate release timing and advertising, although ultimately I'm not sure a high percentage of the public can really stomach a lot of what happens in this movie.

It doesn't come as too much of a surprise that this movie is harshly violent, seeing as the script is from the writer of the movie in which four main characters all die within the space of about seven minutes. The plot revolves around Gibson's gruff old cop reuniting with his daughter only for a few hours before she begins vomiting blood, and just as he's about to take her to the hospital a shotgun-wielding, skimask-wearing assassin appears and dispatches Emma Craven after yelling "Craven" at the top of his lungs. What follows is a tight, engaging mystery in which Tom Craven (played by Gibson) must follow a convoluted trail of evidence to get to the truth about the death of his daughter.

Supporting turns include those of Danny Huston as a characteristically icy villain and Ray Winstone playing my favorite character in the film by far, a fierce but slowly dying freelance killer who provides the majority of the deeper significance of the narrative. Many of his lines are absolutely classic, and the scene at the end in which several major characters die at his hand (I'm starting to sense a pattern with Monahan's movies) is one of my favorite in a movie in a while, including a fantastic exchange that goes something like this--Evil conspiring Senator: "I...am a United States senator..." Ray Winstone: "By what standard?" And he kills him. Awesome.

On a larger scale, this film has a very consistent, authentic feel to it, something which is lacking in most suspense thrillers in the modern age. It is very dark and grim, but not without some dry humor thrown in, and despite the fact that (SPOILER) almost every character with a speaking line in the film is dead by the end, (END SPOILER) it remains a very enjoyable and ultimately rewarding experience.

Another one of the standout features of this film is the jarring and shocking nature of many of the most intense moments of action--including one of the most jarring scenes I've seen, in which a woman is taken out by a car very suddenly and startlingly, and almost all of the scenes in which either Gibson's or Winstone's characters draw their weapons and start shooting without provocation.

While this isn't a masterpiece by any stretch of imagination, it is a breath of fresh air for a film released in the spring, and it is certainly Mel Gibson's best film in seven or eight years; it's also a highly effective and entertaining thriller that stuck with me long after I first saw it.