JUANA SUMMERS, HOST:
The Romani criminal gang known as the Peaky Blinders wreaked havoc in Birmingham, England for six seasons on TV. The series charted the post-World War I rise and fall of brutal gang leader Tommy Shelby and his clan. Now, in "Peaky Blinders: The Immortal Man," the story has shifted to the big screen. Critic Bob Mondello says the film picks up six years after the series left Shelby adrift and alone.
BOB MONDELLO, BYLINE: The year is 1940, and we begin in a German concentration camp where British currency is being counterfeited - a lot of currency, enough to crash Britain's banking system if the Nazis can get it to England. But before we get to the whos and hows, the film checks in with Tommy Shelby, living on the vast country estate he's allowed to fall into ruin since his wife and daughter died. No one comes around now, but he's not forgotten. As Tommy's last ally, Johnny Dogs, tells him.
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PACKY LEE: (As Johnny Dogs) One of the Palmer women recognized me from the old days. She asked me if I knew what ever happened to Tommy Shelby.
CILLIAN MURPHY: (As Tommy Shelby) What did you say to her?
LEE: (As Johnny Dogs) I said, as far as I am aware, the famous gangster Tommy Shelby has withdrawn from this world, and he is writing a book.
MONDELLO: That he is - a book filled with ghosts.
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MURPHY: (As Tommy Shelby) Spirits show themselves to me. My dead daughter, Ruby, plays in the garden. I found a scarf hanging from a branch where (ph) there was no scarf before. It could not have got there any other way.
MONDELLO: But as his sister, Ada, reminds him.
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SOPHIE RUNDLE: (As Ada Thorne) Tommy, you have family who are not ghosts. Your son is running the Peaky Blinders like it's 1919 all over again - worse than you and Arthur ever were.
MURPHY: (As Tommy Shelby) Now, that is very bleak (ph).
MONDELLO: He doesn't know the half. Worse than him and Arthur is truly bleak. And played by a post-"Oppenheimer" Cillian Murphy with gravitas to spare, this soulful psychopath has next to no sway with his son, Duke, who's been riding roughshod over war-ravaged Birmingham, even stealing guns meant for British soldiers.
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UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR #1: (As character) Oi, Peaky Blinders are here.
UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR #2: (As character) What should we do?
UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR #3: (As character) Peaky Blinders going to do whatever the Peaky Blinders want to do.
MONDELLO: And what they want to do under Duke, made steely eyed by actor Barry Keoghan, is outdo what his dad did. Conveniently, Tim Roth's weaselly Nazi operative offers a way.
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TIM ROTH: (As John Beckett) Mr. Shelby, you can keep that.
MONDELLO: Remember those counterfeit banknotes?
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ROTH: (As John Beckett) Plenty more where that came from.
BARRY KEOGHAN: (As Duke Shelby) How much more?
MONDELLO: Staggering sums, not to mention the Blitz, armories full of munitions - everything is bigger, as director Tom Harper and screenwriter Steven Knight ramp up what was always a cinematic show on TV...
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MONDELLO: ...To fill an IMAX screen.
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MONDELLO: Tommy, at the center, is as brutal as ever, but with Nazis as his antagonist, he manages to seem comparatively honorable, a shadowy figure lurking in exquisitely shot shadows, urging his muscular flat cappers and gentlemen thugs in three-piece suits to lace their heroics with a bit of sadism. The film is grim and gritty, muddy and bloody, and as steeped in the anguish of this Romani family's memories as any "Peaky Blinders" fan could wish.
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MONDELLO: And if the faithful are mostly likely to catch it when it gets to Netflix in a couple of weeks, the filmmakers have at least made a big screen case for bigger things to come, including two more seasons of the Shelby family saga. I'm Bob Mondello.
(SOUNDBITE OF NICK CAVE AND THE BAD SEEDS SONG, "RED RIGHT HAND") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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