In this intimate character study, chilly both in setting and in atmosphere, a hitman (Tim Roth) is forced to return to his old Russian-Jewish Brooklyn neighbourhood to carry out an execution. But contact with his family only serves to re-ignite old feuds. Writer/director James Gray, here making a promising debut, elicits meaty performances from Roth, Edward Furlong and Maximilian Schell. However, his tendency to swamp key moments with excessive visual stylistics does sometimes blunt this uncompromising movie's dramatic edge.

Long separated from his family, hitman Joshua returns to Brighton Beach for a contract killing for the Russian Mafia. His abusive father, Arkady, banned him from returning after Joshua committed his first murder. He takes up residence in a hotel, and soon everyone knows he has returned. He goes home to visit his dying mother, Irina, and prepares for the assassination, getting drawn back into the criminal community he left behind.