Martin McDonagh is an award-winning playwright and one of the key innovators of a new genre of theater that has become known as "In Your Face" Theatre. It’s function is to present the audience with vulgar, shocking, and confrontational material on the stage. We’ve seen a couple of his plays, and I think of him as the Quentin Tarrantino of the theatre. McDonagh is the writer and director of In Bruges, his first full-length feature film. It is representative of his bloody but funny plays. Two hit men, Ray (Colin Farrell) and Ken (Brenden Gleeson), are hiding out in Bruges, Belgium. They are awaiting instructions from Harry (Ralph Finnes) their boss. To pass the time, Ken is enjoying the sights of the quaint medieval town. Ray isn’t enjoying much of anything. It’s hard to categorize the film because while much of the film consists of amusing conversations between Ray and Ken, there is also the violence. . . and the blood. . . and the dwarf. Comedy and violence is an unusual combination but, in this case, it’s very entertaining. Farrell and Gleeson are outstanding. Roger Ebert wrote that in the film "there are times of great sadness and poignancy, times of abandon, times of goofiness, and that kind of humor that is really funny because it grows out of character and close observation." And, like Ebert, the movie really made us want to visit Bruges! We suggest you take a chance on this one. GRADE A-