Sexy Beast

Sexy Beast is a 2000 black comedy crime film directed by Jonathan Glazer (in his feature film directorial debut) and written by Louis Mellis and David Scinto. It stars Ray Winstone, Ben Kingsley, and Ian McShane. It follows Gary "Gal" Dove (Winstone), a retired criminal visited by a sociopathic gangster (Kingsley) who demands that he take part in a bank robbery in London.

Sexy Beast was critically acclaimed, and Kingsley's performance earned him an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor. In 2004, Total Film named Sexy Beast the 15th best British film. It was the final film to feature Cavan Kendall, who died of cancer shortly after filming ended.

Plot
British ex-criminal Gary "Gal" Dove is happily retired on the Costa del Sol with his beloved wife DeeDee, his best friend Aitch, and Aitch's wife Jackie. An old criminal associate, the feared sociopath Don Logan, arrives at Gal's villa, intent on enlisting Gal for a bank robbery in London planned by crime lord Teddy Bass. Teddy has learned about the bank vault from Harry, the bank's chairman, whom he met at an orgy. Gal declines, but Don continues to pressure Gal, growing increasingly aggressive and violent.

After Gal suggests that Don's real reason for visiting is his infatuation with Jackie, with whom he had a brief affair, Don grows furious and leaves. On the plane back to England, Don refuses to extinguish his cigarette prior to takeoff, is aggressive to staff and other passengers, and is ejected, but avoids punishment by claiming that a flight attendant sexually assaulted him. He returns to the villa screaming obscenities and attacks Gal with a glass. DeeDee emerges with Gal's hunting shotgun and shoots Don, incapacitating him; the group beat him to death and bury him under the swimming pool.

In London, Gal prepares for the heist. When Teddy questions Gal about Don's whereabouts, Gal claims that Don returned to London and called him from Heathrow Airport. The heist involves using diving gear to drill into the bank vault from a pool in a neighbouring bath house. The pool water muffles the sound of the drilling equipment and also floods the vault and shorts its security system. As Teddy's crew empties the vault's safe deposit boxes, Gal secretly pockets a pair of ruby and diamond earrings.

After the job, Teddy insists on driving Gal to the airport. He stops at Harry's home, where he shoots Harry and demands that Gal tell him where Don is. Gal responds that he is "not into this any more". While dropping Gal off, Teddy indicates that he knows that Gal was involved in something happening to Don, and implies that Gal would be severely punished if Teddy cared at all about Don. He suggests he may visit Gal in Spain and humiliates him by paying him only £10 for the job.

Gal returns to his friends and family in Spain, where DeeDee wears the earrings and life has returned to normal. Gal still hears Don's voice in his head; he responds that Don is dead now and can "shut up".

Cast

 * Ray Winstone as Gary 'Gal' Dove, a retired criminal who married DeeDee and moved to Spain to start a new life
 * Ben Kingsley as Don Logan, a violent sociopath and recruiter for the London underworld
 * Ian McShane as Teddy Bass, a London crime boss
 * Amanda Redman as DeeDee Dove, Gal's beloved wife and a former porn star
 * James Fox as Harry, a banker who shows Bass the vault
 * Cavan Kendall as Aitch, Dove's best friend
 * Julianne White as Jackie, Aitch's wife, who had a fling with Don
 * Álvaro Monje as Enrique, a Spanish houseboy who helps Gal around the house

Production
Sexy Beast was shot in London and Spain in the summer of 1999. Ray Winstone travelled to Spain two weeks before filming commenced to get as deep a tan as he could in the time possible and to eat as much as he could to bulk up considerably. He later called this "the best rehearsal time I've ever had in my life". Winstone had originally been considered for the role of Don, along with Anthony Hopkins.

The producer Jeremy Thomas remembered his experience making the film:

Technical elements of the heist have been compared with those in the 1979 film Sewers of Gold, which also starred McShane in the central role.

Reception
, the film has an approval rating of 87% on Rotten Tomatoes, based on 141 reviews with an average rating of 7.30/10. The site's critical consensus states, "Sexy Beast rises above other movies in the British gangster genre due to its performances—particularly an electrifying one by Ben Kingsley—and the script's attention to character development." On Metacritic, it has a rating of 79/100, indicating "generally favorable reviews".

It received praise from writers at the San Francisco Chronicle, Entertainment Weekly, Slate, Rolling Stone and the Los Angeles Times. Stephen Hunter of The Washington Post was less enthusiastic, describing the plot as "preposterous" and highlighting "Ben Kingsley spraying saliva-lubricated variants of the F-word into the atmosphere like anti-aircraft fire for 10 solid minutes" as the film's "one guilty pleasure".

Box office
Sexy Beast grossed $10.2 million on a budget of $4.3 million, making it a relative box office success.

Awards and honors
Kingsley's performance received a majority of the accolades given to Sexy Beast, winning Best Supporting Actor awards from the Broadcast Film Critics Association, Boston Society of Film Critics, Dallas-Fort Worth Film Critics Association, Florida Film Critics Circle, San Diego Film Critics Society, Southeastern Film Critics Association and the Toronto Film Critics Association. He also was nominated for a Screen Actors Guild Award (losing to Ian McKellen for his performance in The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring), a Golden Globe and an Academy Award (losing both to Jim Broadbent for his performance in Iris).

The film also won Best Director and Best Screenplay from the British Independent Film Awards and Special Recognition ("For excellence in film making") from the National Board of Review.

Music
Original music for the film was composed by Spanish composer/saxophonist Roque Baños and English electronic band UNKLE in collaboration with South. Dean Martin's version of "Sway" accompanies the film's end credits. The soundtrack also includes "Peaches" by The Stranglers, "Cuba" by The Gibson Brothers, "G-Spot" by Wayne Marshall, "Daddy Rollin' Stone" by Derek Martin, and Henry Mancini's "Lujon".

In popular culture
Brian Sella of The Front Bottoms attributes the band's name to a line spoken by Ben Kingsley in the film. Another line spoken by Kingsley inspired The Kooks' song 'Jackie Big Tits'.

Prequel television series
A prequel television series based on the film was in development at Paramount Network, which was being produced by Paramount Television Studios and Anonymous Content. However, the series was scrapped by Paramount Network. On 15 February 2022, ViacomCBS Networks UK And Australia announced that the series was revived for Paramount+, but would instead be produced by Train a Comin' Productions, Familystyle, Chapter One, Solas Mind, Anonymous Content and Paramount Television International Studios. The eight-episode series was released on 25 January 2024.