The Necessary Death of Charlie Countryman

"While traveling abroad, a guy falls for a Romanian beauty whose unreachable heart has its origins in her violent, charismatic ex." (IMDB)

Decent summary really and along the journey of this love story you can enjoy a nice mix of comedy, violence and generally entertaining cinema.  Our main guy Charlie played by Shia LaBeouf sets off to Bucharest, Romania for some soul searching after his mums death.  After a very strange welcome into the country he meets this 'Romanian Beauty' (played by Evan Rachel Wood in a very decent performance) and things really start to spiral out of control.

Early on in the piece though Charlie makes his way to the Marco Polo youth hostel where he meets up with a couple of party heads from the UK.  If you're a fan of either Harry Potter or the Inbetweener's you will love this part as much as I did as these guys are played by Rupert Grint (Ron Weasley) and James Buckley (Jay).   They down a shitload of LSD and X and some really funny shit ensues captured well with some great filming and "I'm on drugs" effects.  I read that LaBeouf actually took LSD for the scene to make it more authentic, would have been a fun day on set no doubt.   A good quote from Buckley - "If I can't take my tin of drugs around with me then the terrorists have already won".  True that!

But then things get more serious as Charlie starts inadvertently getting involved with some pretty nasty fellas.  The poor bastard cops a lot of beatings but he remains true to the cause.  Reminded me a bit of Brick where J.G.L just kept getting pounded into a bloody mess.   Full credit to the casting of the bad guys too - Mads Mikkelsen (Hannibal) and Til Schweiger (Inglorious Basterds) ... not a pair you would want to cross in a hurry. 

Overall the movie is a bit of muddle but the changing style keeps it quite interesting and the story moves along quick enough.  LaBeouf wears a little bit too much dark eye shadow for my liking, makes him look like Khal Drogo but don't let that put you off.  It's worth watching just to see Ron Weasley pop 5 viagra.

7/10

IMDB Info