Director: John Slattery

Starring: Philip Seymour Hoffman, Christina Hendricks, Richard Jenkins 

Cert 15; 88 mins

God’s Pocket feels like watching a television series where you’ve missed the early episodes and are struggling to catch up. Who’s who? What’s what? When is it even set? You assume it is the 1970s.

God’s Pocket is a tight-knit working-class area of Philadelphia. Anyone not born there is forever considered an outsider. A young man’s murder has consequences that spread through the community like ripples on a calm surface. Jeanie (Christina Hendricks) demands the truth about what happened to her son.

His crooked stepfather Mickey Scarpato (Philip Seymour Hoffman) struggles to do anything right and booze-sodden newspaper columnist Richard Shelburn (Richard Jenkins) only creates more trouble with his fine words and ignoble acts.

Mad Men star John Slattery’s downbeat directorial debut has a Coen Brothers feel, especially in its moments of black humour and unexpectedly savage violence.

A great cast (John Turturro, Eddie Marsan etc) keeps it watchable but it never gels into a satisfying whole.