Paul Evans I'll be honest I think seven years is quite a short gap to make a film based largely on the tragic death of Meredith Kercher in 2007, I cannot imagine what the families of all concerned must think, the remainder of my review won't in any other way be clouded my opinions on that fact, tasteless though I find the format.Thomas, a British film maker travels to Siena in Italy, with a view to making a film based on the famous murder several years earlier of Elizabeth, a young student. Elizabeth's friend Jessica and her boyfriend Carlo were arrested for the crime. Thomas meets journalist Simone Ford who offers her advice and help. Jessica was convicted, but a re-trial is set to occur. Thomas begins exploring, he catches site of beautiful young waitress Melanie and forges an acquaintance. Thomas constantly snorts coke, possibly to help him be creative with his script.I know it's a film, but it is stretching the realms of reality, I cannot believe the Police would be keen to speak to any journalists, it would never happen. Plenty of scenes intended to shock, sex, drugs etc.The standard of acting is good on the whole, Daniel Brühl is a wonderfully talented actor, there doesn't seem to be a single role he cannot turn his hand to, the material is sadly a bit lacking for his talent. Cara Delevigne I've grown rather fond of based on her first few performances, I think she's proved a few people wrong, the girl is very good, there's just something about her. I am a fan of Kate Beckinsale, but I have to be honest I found her a little anonymous in this film, she didn't stand out. It is always nice to see Sara Stewart.Some of the imagery really just didn't work, as you get into the film and he starts with the drugs he begins getting some disturbing images, they aren't particularly well realised, none of them work on the whole, the effects are poor.(For any Doctor who fans, do I hear the Ood singing??) The music doesn't seem to be in tune with the film somehow.Overall I think it's a disappointing film, the storytelling itself is largely the issue, it just doesn't flow very well, it's disjointed, and the actions of leading man Thomas somehow feel at odds with the character, through no fault of Daniel Brühl, he battled hard with the script. 4/10

Sup Erhot Persson This is by far the worst movie I have seen in a long time. Throughout the whole thing I was waiting for something to finally start happening. Anything. I compare the experience to being forced to listen to someone whining for hours without an end... There were too many side stories, most of which were utterly boring and only shallowly touching upon the issues of cheating, drug abuse, family problems, psychos, depression. It seems they would throw 'anything' in there but they really failed to find an angle for the story. And this is what the story is about - failure. The main character is a failure, the story is a failure, the fact that murder is not solved is a failure. But the biggest failure of all is this badly directed movie. I have never been so agitated by watching a movie and while in the cinema I was thinking ''why don't you drown now'' about the main character... at least it would make this movie interesting in some way. I wish I could get a refund for watching this.

randymcbeast It boggles my mind how studios pay money for movies like this one. Even worse, because it's not a typical account of the events surrounding this story and more about finding an interesting angle around it, they even have scenes with studio executives that have looks of horror on their faces when the Director talks about how he wants to make it into the trash that it became. Still, they went ahead with it. They must feel like complete fools and I'm guessing such a high valued actress like Kate Beckinsale has her regrets as well.It's just a pretentious pile of poop in the end. Hypocritical as well since it tries to put itself above the trash journalism surrounding this story but ends up putting in the same sensationalistic crap that 'sells' stories. So lame.I was even more disheartened when I saw a few of the UK Utopia actors, Alistair Petrie and Nathan Stewart-Jarrett in the film. They must be gutted being in this one after being in such a great one like Utopia.Thank you for wasting my time BBC Films, Cattleya, Multitrade, Revolution Films, Vedette Finance and Ypsilon Films. There's obviously not a sensible one in the lot of ya.

hxamaranth The movie failed utterly because it had nothing to do with either the events of the crime nor with the trial involving Amanda Kercher and Meredith Knox so viewers who are expecting any enlightenment about these events (and who wasn't) are left short-changed from the start. The characters are clumsy in their purpose to display some sort of point or message for the film so we are let down even more.I would blame this more on the script and directing than the actors but if the actors did a good job then it did not show in the way this story was presented.If I had to guess then I would say that it tried to tell us that the truth of the story was not the thing that people should be focused on but that a beautiful young girl who was loved and had a happy life was lost. Try watching it with this concept in mind and it makes all the poorly presented scenes a little more tolerable.I wonder if Thomas' pursuit of the truth to the murder (as he gets more directly involved with the solution to the case by trying to locate the knives) is what inspires the drug use and silly CGI scenes as a reflection that he was falling into the same unimportant issues that everyone else is. I think his longing for his daughter also parallels the loss that the Kercher family was feeling. Thomas' strife with other journalists may also be a sign that he did not like the opinions of other writers because they were focused on the case and the girl on trial but not on the girl who died ("Strange... when I think of Face of an Angel I always think of Elizabeth. But you all mean Jessica." - Thomas)After writing this review I watched a Q&A by Mark Salisbury with Michael Winterbottom (director) and Paul Viragh (writer) and right off the bat they confirmed what I struggled to believe was the message of the film. I'm sorry that they missed the mark so egregiously and that they used such a high-profile trial in a way that fails its potential as a who-dun-it.