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‘Life on Mars’ stars John Simm and Philip Glenister (above) re-team for this cheap, fairly inventive and twisty heist movie from former actor Sacha Bennett. Indeed, most of the film’s budget looks to have been spent on a cast of familiar TV faces: Kevin McNally and Cristian Solimeno chew up their roles as devoted cop and musclebound thug respectively, and Ashley Walters is bound to raise a few eyebrows as the brains of the outfit.

Unfortunately Bennett’s direction doesn’t do his cast justice: he shoots the entire film in flat, unengaging tones. It doesn’t help that the script, despite a few well-judged, surprising U-turns, remains obvious, aiming for originality in its back-and-forth flashback structure but eventually just feeling confused.

Glenister is always value for money, and Simm makes for a likeably cheeky foil– their scenes together are the highlights of the film. But overall this is just another Brit crime flick: entertaining enough, but tragically unambitious.