Now at the movies: Ballad of a Small Player

Following his overwhelming success with the anti-war film and four-time Oscar® winner "All Quiet on the Western Front" and the also highly successful Vatican thriller "Conclave," Edward Berger has once again taken on the adaptation of a novel. And again, he has secured both an illustrious cast and the collaboration of proven colleagues such as costume designer Lisy Christl and composer Volker Bertelmann: In the German-British co-production "Ballad of a Small Player", based on the novel of the same name by Lawrence Osborne, Colin Farrell plays a gambler known in the scene by the sophisticated-sounding name of Lord Doyle, but who is actually the son of a vacuum cleaner salesman. Deep in debt, he goes into hiding in Macau, China, to escape his creditors, but things don't get any better for him there: soon he can't even afford to pay for his hotel. Only a kind-hearted casino employee supports him, while at the same time the relentless private detective Cynthia Blithe (Tilda Swinton) is hot on his heels... Berger tells the story of how Doyle sinks deeper and deeper into a downward spiral, only for a mysterious saviour to come into play, in fascinating, dark, neon-coloured images. Colin Farrell's brilliant performance alone – some are already treating him as the next Oscar® contender – makes it worth going to the cinema.