I saw this the same evening I went to see 2012, this film was in smaller room but it was packed and I can see why. 2012 should get an Oscar for special effects but this film had all that the bigger budget movie lacked - pace, direction, emotional appeal, setting, gripping story and purpose.
The premise is 'broken' Britain, the one away from the nice parts that we want to live in, the influence of Ken Loach, who has been making these for years was there in the depiction of the setting but the story was very much a 50's western. The problems it clearly depicts are the legacy of 1980's government policy and how they smashed communities and the fabric of society.
The film highlights the failure of the police and authority on these estates (the TV show Spiral II does this too) and the isolation many who live their feel in face of this official indifference and how they are preyed on by their own: however,the solution it presents, 'vigilantism' is unreal.
The film is raw and the presentation of the lead character is realistic and human - a man from another age who has somehow arrived in a different country. I think films in the 70's also depicted this kind of hell to scare the folks in the nice houses who see these people as 'not like' them and ignore the underclass. The denouement makes great cinema, keeps it feet in the real world but for all that, is an unrealistic solution to the problems it highlights - everyone knows in that another gang would move into the vacuum created by the termination of the criminals unless there was social investment.
The premise is 'broken' Britain, the one away from the nice parts that we want to live in, the influence of Ken Loach, who has been making these for years was there in the depiction of the setting but the story was very much a 50's western. The problems it clearly depicts are the legacy of 1980's government policy and how they smashed communities and the fabric of society.
The film highlights the failure of the police and authority on these estates (the TV show Spiral II does this too) and the isolation many who live their feel in face of this official indifference and how they are preyed on by their own: however,the solution it presents, 'vigilantism' is unreal.
The film is raw and the presentation of the lead character is realistic and human - a man from another age who has somehow arrived in a different country. I think films in the 70's also depicted this kind of hell to scare the folks in the nice houses who see these people as 'not like' them and ignore the underclass. The denouement makes great cinema, keeps it feet in the real world but for all that, is an unrealistic solution to the problems it highlights - everyone knows in that another gang would move into the vacuum created by the termination of the criminals unless there was social investment.
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