Domino (film)

Domino
Film poster
Directed by	Tony Scott
Produced by	Samuel Hadida Tony Scott
Written by	Richard Kelly
Narrated by	Keira Knightley
Starring	Keira Knightley Mickey Rourke Edgar Ramirez Jacqueline Bisset Delroy Lindo Mo'Nique Mena Suvari Dabney Coleman Lucy Liu Christopher Walken
Music by	Harry Gregson-Williams
Cinematography	Dan Mindel
Editing by	William Goldenberg Christian Wagner
Studio	Scott Free Productions
Distributed by	New Line Cinema
Release date(s)	September 25, 2005 (2005-09-25) (WFF) October 14, 2005 (2005-10-14) (United States) November 23, 2005 (2005-11-23) (France)
Running time	127 minutes
Country	France United States
Language	English
Budget	$50 million
Box office	$22,944,502

Domino is a 2005 American action film directed by Tony Scott and written by Richard Kelly. It is inspired by the story of Domino Harvey, the English daughter of stage and screen actor Laurence Harvey, who became a bounty hunter working in Los Angeles. The film stars Keira Knightley as Domino and also features Mickey Rourke, Edgar Ramirez, Delroy Lindo and Mo'Nique in supporting roles. The film is dedicated to Harvey, who died at only 35 years of age from an accidental overdose of fentanyl on June 27, 2005, before the film was released.

Plot

Domino Harvey (Keira Knightley), a bounty hunter, has been arrested by the FBI, which is investigating the theft of $10 million from an armored truck 36 hours prior. Domino is interviewed by criminal psychologist Taryn Mills (Lucy Liu) and agrees to tell her everything she knows about the case.

Domino, a former model living in Los Angeles becomes a bounty hunter when, after being kicked out of college, she notices a newspaper advertisement for a bounty hunter training seminar. Her colleagues are Ed Moseby (Mickey Rourke), Choco (Edgar Ramirez) and their Afghani driver Alf (Riz Abbasi). They are employed by Claremont Williams III (Delroy Lindo), a bail bondsman who also runs an armored car business. Claremont's mistress, Lateesha Rodriguez (Mo'Nique), works for the California Department of Motor Vehicles. Her granddaughter Mica is suffering from a blood disease and needs an operation urgently. The operation Mica needs costs $300,000 which Lateesha does not have. Claremont comes up with a plan to get the money by setting up the robbery of $10 million from Drake Bishop (Dabney Coleman), the billionaire owner of the Stratosphere Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas and a client of Claremont's armored car business. His bounty hunters would then return the stolen money and collect a $300,000 finder's fee from Bishop.

Edgar Ramirez as Choco, Keira Knightley as Domino and Mickey Rourke as Ed.

Lateesha has been running a counterfeit driver's license racket at the DMV. A teenager named Frances arrives at the DMV and asks Lateesha for fake driver's licenses for himself, his brother, and two of their friends. The FBI are tipped about Lateesha's counterfeit driver's license racket. They threaten to send her to jail unless she gives them information about Frances, whom they have been surveilling. Lateesha throws them off the trail by stating that Frances, his brother and his two friends are going to commit the robbery, when in reality she and Claremont are planning on doing it themselves.

Lateesha successfully carries out the robbery with the help of three of her co-workers. Claremont then finds out that Frances and his brother, who Lateesha framed for the robbery, are the sons of mafia boss Anthony Cigliutti. He phones Lateesha and tells her to abort the plan, leaving the money with getaway driver Locus Fender who takes the money to his mother's trailer home. Claremont has the bounty hunters apprehend Frances, his brother and his two friends and then tells them to deliver them to men working for Drake Bishop. Claremont next tells them to retrieve the money from Locus Fender and to deliver it to Bishop at the Stratosphere Casino. Following a shootout with Locus's mother the money is retrieved. Cigliutti is told about his sons' arrest and is led to believe that Bishop has had his sons killed. In reality Bishop's men released them on finding that they did not know anything about the robbery. Believing his sons dead, Cigliutti is now out for revenge and, together with his crew, heads for the Stratosphere. In Las Vegas, Domino takes $300,000 of Bishop's money and gives it to Lateesha for Mica's operation.

At the Stratosphere, the bounty hunters meet with Bishop, who has an armed crew with him. Domino and Bishop discuss the money and what should happen next. However, unknown to the bounty hunters, Alf has stolen the money and filled the sacks with plastic explosives. He then reveals that he has the remote detonator taped to his hand, and has already shipped the money to aid freedom fighters in Afghanistan. Shortly after this revelation Anthony Cigliutti turns up with his crew. Though Bishop denies he has had Cigliutti's sons killed, Cigliutti shoots Bishop. In the ensuing gunfight Choco and Ed are severely wounded, but manage to make it into the elevator with the unwounded Domino. Alf waits as long as he can before detonating the explosives, blowing up the top of the Stratosphere, and Domino is the only survivor from the ensuing carnage.

After having told Taryn Mills everything, Domino is released by the FBI. Mills advises Domino to retire from bounty hunting. The film concludes with the money in boxes being delivered to Afghanistan and opened by celebrating children in the streets, Mica getting her operation, and Domino sharing a moment with her mother by the poolside. During the last moments Domino narrates, "I saved her... And when she is older, a woman named Domino will tell her that there is only one conclusion to every story... We all fall down."

Cast

• Keira Knightley as Domino Harvey. Tony Scott thought of Knightley for the role after seeing her in Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl.^[1]
• Mickey Rourke as Ed Moseby. Rourke initially turned down the film, describing the part of bounty hunter Ed Moseby as "one dimensional". He agreed to do the film when Tony Scott had the role rewritten.^[2]
• Edgar Ramirez as Choco
• Riz Abbasi as Alf
• Delroy Lindo as Claremont Williams III
• Mo'Nique as Lateesha Rodriguez
• Dabney Coleman as Drake Bishop
• Lucy Liu as Taryn Mills
• Jacqueline Bisset as Sophie Wynn
• Christopher Walken as Mark Heiss
• Mena Suvari as Kimmie
• Ian Ziering and Brian Austin Green as themselves
• Tom Waits as the Wanderer
• Jerry Springer also appears as himself
• Kel O'Neill as Frances
• Peter Jacobson as Burke Beckett
• Dale Dickey as Edna Fender
• Lew Temple as Locus Fender
• Fred Koehler as Chuckie.
• Charles Paraventi as Howie Stein
• T.K. Carter as Lester Kincaid
• Ashley Monique Clark as Kee Kee Rodriguez
• Joseph Nunez as Raul Chavez
• Tabitha Brownstone as a eight year old Domino
• Adam Clark as agent Eric Cosgrove
• Donna Scott as agent Dina Wilson.

Development

The real Domino Harvey

In 1994 director Tony Scott was sent an article from the British newspaper The Mail on Sunday by his business manager Neville Shulman. The article, written by Sacha Gervasi and titled My gun for hire: Why a movie star's rebel daughter turned into a bounty hunter, was about an English woman named Domino Harvey who was working as a bounty hunter, apprehending fugitives who had skipped bail for the Celes King Bail Bond agency in South Central Los Angeles. While Harvey was one of the few female bounty hunters,^[3] what caught the attention of Shulman and Scott was that she was the daughter of the late actor Laurence Harvey.

Tony Scott tracked Domino to Beverly Hills where she was living at the time with her mother Paulene Stone and Stone's then husband Peter Morton. He invited Domino to his office where he proposed a film of her life. Domino agreed and sold the film rights to her life. According to the Los Angeles Times, Harvey was paid $360,000 for the rights.^[4] Tony Scott interviewed Harvey about her life and her work bounty hunting. Scott also met and interviewed Ed Martinez and Choco, who were Domino's bounty hunting colleagues. She took him to meet Celes King III, the bail bondsman whom they worked for.

20th Century Fox, which had a first refusal deal on the project, turned it down^[5] and in the end the film was financed by New Line Cinema.

Steve Barancik wrote the first draft of the screenplay^[6][7] in 1997^[8] which Tony Scott rejected. A second script was written by Roger Avary^[9] which was also rejected by Scott. Scott described the two rejected screenplays as conventional biopics of Domino Harvey's life, which was not what he had in mind for the film. Finally, Richard Kelly was asked to write the screenplay after Scott read his script for Southland Tales.^[10] Kelly was sent transcripts of Domino Harvey's interviews with Tony Scott, though he did not read the scripts that Scott had rejected.^[11] In discussing the finished product, Kelly commented that "...Domino might be one of the most subversive films released by a major studio since Fight Club".^[12]

Release

The release date of the film was announced and delayed several times. The original release date was August 19, 2005. On May 22, 2005, the release date was changed to November 4, 2005. On June 28, 2005, the release date was changed to November 23, 2005. On July 11, 2005, it was moved to October 14, 2005, which was the date the film was released on.^[13] The film had its premiere on October 11, 2005 in Los Angeles.

The film was released on October 14, 2005 in 2223 theaters across America and grossed $4,670,120 on its opening weekend. The film stayed in release for four weeks and ended up with a gross of $10,169,202. In other territories, the film grossed $12,775,300 which, added to the domestic gross, gave the film a total worldwide gross of $22,944,502. This was an overall loss compared to the film's estimated $50,000,000 budget.^[14]

Reception

Domino received mostly negative reviews. Review aggregate website Rotten Tomatoes gives the film a score of 19%, based on 151 reviews, with an average rating of 3.9/10^[15]. At the website Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the film has received a rating average of 36, based on 36 reviews, which it ranks as "generally unfavorable"^[16].

Home media

The film was released on DVD on February 21, 2006. The DVD contained several extra features including an audio commentary with Tony Scott and Richard Kelly, deleted scenes from the film, featurettes on Domino Harvey and the visual style of the film, the teaser trailer and the theatrical trailer. While the film was released in its original widescreen format in all DVD regions, the film was also released in a fullscreen format on Region 1.^[17] The film was released on Blu-ray on January 20, 2009.^[18]

See also

Film portal

• 2005 in film
• Cinema of the United States
• List of American films of 2005

References

1. ^ Hewitt, Chris, Scott of the Kinetic, empireonline.com, retrieved 2/6/2009
2. ^ "Domino" Interviews:Mickey Rourke and Edgar Ramirez, Hollywood.com, retrieved 9/6/08
3. ^ Summers, Chris When hunting people is a career, BBC News Online, October 12, 2005, Retrieved May 21, 2007
4. ^ Lee, Chris, The Fall of a Thrill Hunter, The Los Angeles Times, July 22, 2005, Retrieved May 24, 2007
5. ^ Hart, Hugh, A rich, beautiful bounty hunter, sfgate.com, October 9, 2005, retrieved June 9, 2008
6. ^ Audio commentary featuring Tony Scott and Richard Kelly on the DVD
7. ^ Mayflower, Darwin, "TOP TEN UNPRODUCED SCRIPTS", screenwritersutopia.com, 8/8/00, retrieved 15/3/11
8. ^ Barancik, Steve, "Domino", www.faqs.org, retrieved 9/4/11
9. ^ Knowles, Harry, "Harry looks at Richard Kelly's script for DOMINO a film by Tony Scott!", www.aintitcool.com, 13/2/03, retrieved 9/4/11
10. ^ Domino Production Notes keiraweb.com Retrieved May 18, 2007
11. ^ Murray, Rebecca, Richard Kelly Discusses "Domino", "Working with Tony Scott, and "Southland Tales", About.com, August 30, 2005, Retrieved May 24, 2007
12. ^ Richard sets the record straight on Domino, richard-kelly.net, June 30, 2005, Retrieved May 24, 2007
13. ^ Domino promotions page, keiraweb.com, retrieved October 4, 2007
14. ^ Box office/business for Domino Internet Movie Database.
15. ^ "Rotten Tomatoes". http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/domino/. Retrieved 15 September 2011. 
16. ^ "Metacritic". http://www.metacritic.com/movie/domino. Retrieved 15 September 2011. 
17. ^ Domino DVD Comparison dvdcompare.net Retrieved September 31, 2007
18. ^ Domino (US BD) in January dvdtimes.co.uk retrieved February 9, 2009

External links

• Domino at the Internet Movie Database
• Domino at AllRovi
• Domino at the TCM Movie Database
• Domino at Rotten Tomatoes
• Domino at Metacritic
• Domino at Box Office Mojo
• Domino script