Breaking and Entering is a 2006 romantic crime drama film written and directed by Anthony Minghella and starring Jude Law, Juliette Binoche, and Robin Wright. It was his first original screenplay since his 1990 feature debut Truly, Madly, Deeply and his final feature film before his death in 2008. Set in a blighted, inner-city neighbourhood of London, the film is about a successful landscape architect whose dealings with a young thief and his mother cause him to re-evaluate his life.

Minghella previously directed the film s stars – Jude Law in Cold Mountain and The Talented Mr. Ripley, and Juliette Binoche in The English Patient. In his first major film role, Rafi Gavron portrays Miro, the young traceur burglar, a role requiring several difficult physical feats. The film is a presentation of Miramax Films and The Weinstein Company (TWC) and was distributed in the United States by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM). Breaking and Entering premiered on 13 September 2006 at the Toronto International Film Festival.

Plot

Will Francis, a young Englishman, is a landscape architect living a detached, routine-based life in London with his Swedish-American girlfriend Liv and her autistic daughter Bea. The 14-year-old girl s irregular sleeping and eating habits as well as her unsocial behaviour (she has trouble relating to people and seems only interested in doing somersaults and gymnastics) reach worrying proportions and start to put a lot of strain on Will and Liv s relationship. Complicating the situation further is his feeling of being shut out of their inner circle since Bea is not his biological daughter. He and Liv start relationship counseling, but their drifting apart continues.

Simultaneously on the business front, Will s and his partner Sandy s state-of-the-art offices in the Kings Cross area are repeatedly burgled by a group of Slavic-language-speaking thieves. The thieves employ a 15-year-old traceur named Mirsad Miro whose acrobatic skills allow them to enter the building. Miro is actually a refugee from Bosnia and Herzegovina living with his Bosnian Muslim mother Amira (Juliette Binoche) who works as a seamstress, while his Serbian father got murdered during the war.

Though they re puzzled about the burglars ability to disable the alarm, the two architects are not particularly worried after the first break-in, mostly writing it off to the neighbourhood s dodgy reputation. However, after the second break-in, they decide to stake out the building after hours hoping to find the culprit and alert the police. Being out of the house on nightly stakeouts actually suits Will just fine, allowing him to get away from the cold atmosphere of his household.

Will strikes up a strange acquaintance with an Eastern European prostitute named Oana (Vera Farmiga) who hangs around the area every night. Spotting Miro attempting to break in one night, Will attempts to follow him. This pursuit leads Will to the flat where Miro lives with his mother Amira. Realizing their modest living means, he decides not to report his findings to the police but goes back to Amira s apartment under the guise of having a suit that needs mending.

He soon becomes emotionally entangled with her, causing him to re-evaluate his life. Conflict arises when the police close in on the burglars, and Will must make a crucial choice which will affect the lives of everyone around him.

Cast

• Jude Law as Will Francis
• Juliette Binoche as Amira Simić
• Robin Wright as Liv
• Romi Aboulafia as Orit
• Rafi Gavron as Mirsad Miro Simić
• Martin Freeman as Sandy Hoffman
• Juliet Stevenson as Rosemary McCloud
• Ed Westwick as Zoran
• Velibor Topic as Vlado
• Rad Lazar as Dragan
• Poppy Rogers as Beatrice Bea
• Anna Chancellor as Kate
• Mark Benton as Legge
• Ray Winstone as Bruno Fella
• Vera Farmiga as Oana
• Ting-Ting Hu as Wei Ping
• O-T Fagbenle as Joe

Production

Filming locations

The film centres on the area of King s Cross, London. The filming location for Amira s flat is Rowley Way, South Hampstead, London. Since a suitable location near Kings Cross couldn t be found, Will s office was recreated in an old foundry located in Dace Road, by the Old Ford Lock, in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets. Other locations include:

• Alexandra Palace, Haringey, London, England, UK (Miro and the cop)
• Camden Market, London, England, UK
• Hackney Wick, London, England, UK
• Hungerford Bridge, London, England, UK (sunset)
• King s Cross Station, King s Cross, London, England, UK
• Muswell Hill, Haringey, London, England, UK
• Primrose Hill, London, England, UK (sunset)
• Rowley Way, South Hampstead, London, England, UK (Amira s flat)
• St. Pancras Station, St. Pancras, London, England, UK

Soundtrack

Gabriel Yared and Underworld collaborated on the film s original music score.

Reception

Breaking and Entering received largely negative reviews from film critics, with review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes giving the film a 34% rating based on 130 film critic reviews. The site s consensus reads: This class warfare drama feels contrived and superficial: characters don t act logically as the movie manipulates them towards deconstructing various social issues. On Metacritic, the film holds a 56 out of 100 rating, based on 27 reviews.

External links

• Breaking and Entering at IMDb
• Breaking and Entering at Box Office Mojo
• Breaking and Entering at Rotten Tomatoes

Year	2006
ReleaseDate	2006-11-10
RuntimeMins	120
RuntimeStr	2h
Plot	A landscape architect’s dealings with a young thief cause him to re-evaluate his life.
Awards	Awards, 6 nominations total
Directors	Anthony Minghella
Writers	Anthony Minghella
Stars	Jude Law, Robin Wright, Vera Farmiga
Second Cast	Kwesi Asiedu-Mensah, James Cook, Roberto Davide, Ian Houghton, Michael Shaeffer, Michael Smiley
Producer	Steve E. Andrews, Tim Bricknell, DTeflon, David Greenbaum, Anthony Minghella, Anita Overland, Sydney Pollack, Colin Vaines, Bob Weinstein, Harvey Weinstein
Composer	Karl Hyde, Rick Smith, Gabriel Yared
Cinematographer	Benoît Delhomme
Editor	Lisa Gunning
Casting Director	Michelle Guish, Gaby Kester
Production Designer	Alex McDowell
Art Director	Andy Nicholson
Set Decorator	Anna Pinnock
Costume Designer	Natalie Ward
Make Up Department	Laura Blount, Abi Brotherton, Julie Dartnell, Ivana Primorac, Julie Thom
Production Manager	Tim Clawson, Clare Maclean, Lisa Parker, Josh Yudkin
Assistant Director	Steve E. Andrews, Paul Bennett, Tim Bricknell, Caroline Chapman, Todd Embling, Emily Perowne, George Taylor, Anthony Wilcox
Art Department	Barry Abbot, Alex Aitken, David Allday, Ronald Bede, Steven Bede, Paul Beeson, Tim Browning, Daniel Burke, Sophia Chowdhury, Temple Clark
Sound Department	James Bennett, Jason Bennett, Martin Cantwell, Simon Chase, Michael Fentum, Kostas Gkikas, Peter Gleaves, Matthew Gough, Jim Greenhorn, Mark Hackett
Special Effects	Richard Conway, Sam Conway, Robin Earle, Steve Paton, Mark White
Visual Effects	Louie Alexander, Tim Baxter, Andy Burrow, Oliver Deen, Jerome Dewhurst, Ian Differ, Alec East, Miro Gal, Adam Glasman, Jonathan Edward Graham
Stunts	Andy Bradshaw, Michael Byrch, Bruce Cain, Nick Chopping, Bill Davey, Steve Dent, Frank Henson, Mark Henson, Gary Hoptrough, Rob Inch
Camera Department	Anthony Benjamin, Robert Binnall, Paul Borg, Bill Bullpitt, Andy Cole, Johnny Colley, Benjamin Croce, Justin Denchfield, Jason Dully, Charlie England
Casting Department	Vanessa Baker, Grace Browning, Brendan Donnison
Costume Department	Abbie Chapman, Mark Ferguson, Natalia Georgiadou, Yannick Gondran, Michael Weldon, Tamsin Wright, Esme Young
Editorial Department	Chris Andrews, Ravi Desai, Ian Differ, Adam Glasman, Jan Hogevold, Claire McGrane, Laura Morrod, Thy Quach, Kelly Smith, Maria Stroka
Location Management	Jonah Coombes, Tom Crooke, Rebecca Davis, Ben Gladstone, Vinnie Jassal, Amelia McNeil, Jo Sheehan, Josh Yudkin
Music Department	John Bell, Mark Berrow, Peter Cobbin, Malcolm Corbitt, Mike Gillespie, Isobel Griffiths, Robert Houston, Nick Ingman, Dado Jehan, Allan Jenkins
Script Department	Jo Beckett, Dianne Dreyer, Aminta Townshend
Transportation Department	Steve Agius, Noel Allen, Steve Bignall, Charles Bodycomb, John Boy, Bill Clarke, Ian Clarke, Nobby Clarke, Mark Crowley, Danny Effelman
Miscellaneous	Simon Adams, Holly Asquith, Guy Barker, John Barnes, Ilka Becker, Andy Bird, Jarrod Bolton, Boris Boscovic, Nicole Carmen-Davis, Karen Cattini
Thanks	Kwesi Asiedu-Mensah, Mick Caldwell, Marc Carter, Isabel Coman, Roberto Davide, Lisa Doughty, Gerard Horan, Ken Livingstone, Frank Luke, Roger Madelin
Genres	Crime, Drama, Romance
Companies	Miramax, Mirage Enterprises
Countries	UK, USA
Languages	English, Serbo-Croatian
ContentRating	R
ImDbRating	6.5
ImDbRatingVotes	23580
MetacriticRating	56
Keywords	family conflict,female full frontal nudity,female rear nudity,teenage boy,unfaithful boyfriend