ADAPTED BY James Hawes from his own novel, Rancid Aluminium is the tale of two thirty-something businessmen embroiled in a chancy liaison with a Russian Mafia boss. Pete (Rhys Ifans, above), desperate to save the family business he has just inherited, is encouraged by long-standing friend and accountant Deeny (Joseph Fiennes) to borrow the money he needs from the sinister Mr Kant (Stephen Berkoff). His problems, however, are only just beginning. His relationship with his girlfriend (Sadie Frost, above) is fraught and Deeny is plotting against him. Rancid Aluminium, with a bizarrely disparate cast that includes Dani Behr and Keith Allen and its right-on soundtrack, has pretensions to become the next cool Brit-pack flick. It's enjoyable enough, on a superficial level, but in trying to work as a dark, comic-book tale, it struggles to strike a chord as either a black comedy or a suspenseful action thriller.