Every Matthew Vaughn Movie Ranked From Worst To Best

After serving as producer on Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels and Snatch, Matthew Vaughn showed Guy Ritchie how the quintessentially British gangster flick should be done with his directorial debut, Layer Cake.

Vaughn's adaptation of J. J. Connolly's novel is believed to be the movie which landed Daniel Craig the James Bond gig, and it's easy to see why.

Craig excels in the role of a nameless career criminal who finds himself with no advantage over his dim-witted peers because they're actions are impossible to predict. His cockney cool only gets him so far in the world of Layer Cake, and that's just one of the ways Vaughn subverts the gangster drama.

Stylistically, Layer Cake has the look and feel of an early Guy Ritchie movie, but unlike Lock, Stock and its sequel, it never falls into the trap of trying to be too clever, even though it basically trolls the audience at the end.