Director:Â Pete Travis
Cast: Riz Ahmed,  Billie Piper,  James Floyd,  Cush Jumbo, Roshan Seth,  Hannah Rae
Rating: 15
Running Time: 110 minutes
Release Date:Â 07/04/2017
There is much debate about the issue of diversity in entertainment at the moment and the dialogue certainly is becoming a welcome one. With MOONLIGHT’s recent win at the Oscars over LA LA LAND, whether or not a film that analyzes issues of race and gender can prevail continues to open minds to discussion. Ultimately, regardless of the issue, it boils down to how effective a story can be told.
Patrick Neate’s novel CITY OF TINY LIGHTS, published in 2005, has now been developed into a brand-new film, directed by Pete Travis and starring Riz Ahmed, fresh from his success in ROGUE ONE, with Billie Piper, the pop moppet-turned-acclaimed thespian who has demonstrated poise and presence on stage with her recent theatre endeavours. As such, the result is part-noir and part urban tragedy.
Tommy Akhtar (Ahmed) is a London-based private detective, who lives with his father Farzad (Roshan Seth), who is assigned by a woman call-girl called Melody (Cush Jumbo) to track down and locate one of her native Russian co-workers. The trail leads him to a hotel room, where he discovers the dead body of a businessman. As the net widens, Akhtar reacquaints himself with an old school friend, restauranteur Shelley (Piper), whose affinity with Tommy hides a history of tragic consequence….
The tone of the film is suggestive of a mix of CHINATOWN and SLEEPERS, though at times the story appears to be under-developed on both arcs. The relationship between Tonmy and Shelley never quite hits the right mark and the private detective angle doesn’t quite pan out as in the Polanski classic, The film-makers should be applauded for at least attempting to transpose those noir-ish trademarks in the context of a London-based locale (LONDON BOULEVARD, with Colin Farrell and Keira Knightley, and ENDURING LOVE with Daniel Craig, are two other examples of British films that attempted to transpose these narrative ideas with mixed success)
Roshan Seth, the veteran Asian actor who featured in such high-profile work as GANDHI and INDIANA JONES AND THE TEMPLE OF DOOM, steals the show as Tommy’s father, evoking the right balance of charm and patriarch majesty, right up to the very end of the film.
CITY OF TINY LIGHTS is an admirable attempt at the potential of mixed-genre storytelling. It does have a fair amount of funny moments, provided by his young sidekick (Antonio Aakeel), and Ahmed does hold his own. However, the overall feeling is that one story strand would have been just as effective.
In terms of the dynamic of the relationship between Tommy and Shelley, particularly, he could have been any number of professionals instead of a private detective and the story would have worked as well.
Verdict
