London Boulevard" starts off with a premise worthy of any British crime film: Hard man Mitchel (Colin Farrell) is just out of prison, after serving time for murder, and he's not eager to go back in. His sketchy South London friend Billy (Ben Chaplin), however, welcomes him back with open arms and pressures him to provide some muscle for his loan-sharking operation.
Meanwhile, cinema superstar Charlotte (Keira Knightley) has been tabloid fodder for so long that she's bugged out, too paranoid to leave her high-walled London manor, and besieged by a continuous pack of braying paparazzi with zoom lenses. Her only company is her drug-addled platonic friend Jordan (David Thewlis), who's looking for someone to handle security at her home, which is where Mitchel comes in. So far, so good.
Intriguing complications arise: Mitchel's sister, Briony (Anna Friel), is a promiscuous alcoholic with a nose for trouble, and Billy's psychotic boss, Gant (Ray Winstone), makes Mitchel an offer he can't refuse to run some of his territory. Will Mitchel manage to go straight — and find a future with Charlotte, to whom he's attracted — or will he wind up being a thug the rest of his life? And will the viewer, who's seen this sort of thing play out in a dozen other hardboiled neo-noirs, find anything new here?