FRACTURE (Rated R)

Playing the cold, calculating and diabolically clever villain is practically journeyman work for talented actor Anthony Hopkins. It’s something he perfected in the character of Hannibal Lecter.

While the courtroom thriller “Fracture” does not require Hopkins to go to such extremes, the ease with which he is cunning and devious in a battle of wills during a trial is nothing less than stunning.

As the defendant in a criminal trial, Hopkins plays to the hilt his role of the chess master who is thinking through every possible move and countermove. It’s a guilty pleasure watching a charming sociopath game his way through the legal system.

“Fracture” begins with Hopkins’ millionaire Ted Crawford tailing his beautiful younger wife Jennifer (Embeth Davidtz) to a hotel in Santa Monica where she’s having an affair. Then he waits for her to return home, and after declaring his love for her, he pulls out a handgun and shoots her point blank in the face.

Calmly and carefully, after tidying up the crime scene, he waits for the police to arrive before making a confession. Most curiously, the officer on the scene is Rob Nunally (Billy Burke), the very same person having the affair with the suspect’s wife.

Of course, the situation gets messy when the officer flies into a rage, and yet Ted is already thinking about three steps ahead. This review does not intend to spoil the surprises, but suffice it to say there are plenty of twists that loom on the horizon.

Though he has confessed to the shooting, Ted is cleverly setting in motion a very twisted plot that could allow him to walk as free as O.J. Simpson. One thing to keep in mind is that Jennifer does not die from the gunshot wound, but she ends up in a coma on life support.

After being arraigned for attempted murder, Ted shifts his plea to not guilty when he gets a chance to have a face-off with young hotshot prosecutor Willy Beachum (Ryan Gosling), who has one foot out the door of the District Attorney’s office on his way to a very lucrative job in a corporate law firm.

The cocky, overeager Willy assures his boss, the District Attorney (David Strathairn), that the case is such a slam-dunk that he can wind it up with a guilty verdict before he even finishes cleaning out his desk drawer.

There’s nothing simple about this case, or even for that matter about how Willy will transition to the private sector, especially since he’s falling into a torrid affair with his sexy new boss Nikki Gardner (Rosamund Pike), which in itself is fraught with peril for his new career.

Meanwhile, Ted quickly sizes up his courtroom adversary and seizes upon Willy’s weak spots, which are easy to exploit when many distractions get in the way. The edge goes to Ted because he is brilliant and fierce, mostly because he made his fortune as an aeronautical engineer specializing in fracture mechanics, analyzing malfunctions and plane crashes with his uncanny ability to spot even the smallest defect or weakness in any system.

In the courtroom, Willy is so sure of himself that he can’t see the oncoming train. Ted pulls out all the stops in his bag of tricks, and the verbal jousting between the cagey old man and the arrogant youngster is a real treat.

“Fracture” is not a film that one should take too seriously, because if you diligently apply some analytical skills the flaws and imperfections may become too easily detectable, much in the same way Ted would perform a study of the fuselage of a downed aircraft.

But one should not quibble over the small matters, because “Fracture” entertains greatly as it allows Ted to taunt Willy in a delicious cat-and-mouse game that enlivens the whole affair. Watching Anthony Hopkins and Ryan Gosling spar with each other in a clever battle of wits is just too much fun to pass up. “Fracture” beckons us to a ringside seat for some dazzling theatrics.

Tim Riley writes film reviews for Lake County News.

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