I find it difficult to objectively write a full review of this title "Triads, Yardies, Onion Bhagees" as I only could manage 30 minutes. The concept of a multi-culturally controlled London criminal underworld and their struggles for dominance and diplomacy is a good one. Yet, it has been used before. Anyone thinking the Grand Theft Auto games if you replace London with "generic American city"?
As a fan of innovative screenplay, hand-held cameras and gritty settings I should be sympathetic towards this film. It reminded me of a poor attempt between the Shield and Jean Luc Goddard's Breathless. Having now related those two brilliant titles to this makes me feel dirty... If you watch the film, you'll see what I mean with the whole film being done through hand-held camera with not one single establishing shot. This I can survive with for half an hour - but please... there has to be sometime to rest! The camera often tried to show off with some freezes and zooming in. Some showy angles and trying basically to be exciting. Often it seemed to much a student project but once in a while there was a good shot. Problem was with this, when one was found, the trick was abused and used over and over again. In some ways, it was like watching an advert with fast changes from angles and moments within a scene, dialogue being narrated much like one long incessant movie commercial for a film rather than a film itself. This concept never seemed to stop and became more confusing than flashy. These jump cuts being used like French New Wave on crack!
The soundtrack had some good samples. However, the problem lies there. They should have remained samples. Through the first 30 minutes, ten second samples were looped over and over in certain scenes. Changing to another sample for the next scene. In fact, the soundtrack NEVER stops. One scene is a bhangra sample on loop, next it's some gangsta rap. It's also louder than the speech. My thoughts for this were to fill the lack of dialogue and to cover it's poor content for when someone did say something.
The acting was waaaaay over the top. Not one actor held my attention, sympathy or drew any kind of interest. Many of the actors seemed to have little experience of acting to the point of being dragged off the street. The worst moment had to be the introduction to the Chinese boss. This was the only point where a soundtrack stopped... only replaced with an ambient tone... in an attempt to appear mystic and frightening, his accent was Oxbridge, but his overacting and whispering with little gestures were pretty cringe worthy. His bodyguards were the most disappointing - especially their dresscode which was probably attempting to be Matrix-esquire.
The realism is pretty poor without a doubt. Whether this was intentional, I am uncertain. Research into the subject is laughable. One thing that particularly bugged me was a character in almost every scene would have to have a gun as a prop at one point. Whether to caress, pull out and put on the table and shove in someone's face. Now, I'm not a gangster but surely some subtly is required. Maybe it's just to remind the audience we're looking at gangsters. Having said that, I did notice a blatant yet respectable homage to Scarface where a line of coke is done off the DVD box...
CGI and effects are non-existent. Clearly, this is a low budget film. So I wouldn't expect there to be. But one attempt at a gunshot when the bullet missed and hit the wall was embarrassing! The was a little fireball on the wall when the bullet hit which looked like a cartoon explosion from an old arcade game. On top of that, it was in colour. The rest of the film is in black and white.
Regarding the grainy black and white setting. A lot of people have been quite critical of this. Personally, like the concept of the film and some of it's ideas; it isn't bad. They're just done too many times, too blatantly and abused. Of course, this isn't the case with the black and white, since they've stuck to it. As a fan of New Wave, I would say black and white with a touch of grain deserves a nod every now and then; it's a great effect for a film. But unfortunately not to everyone's taste.
This film I'd say 2 stars. Maybe some people out there like watching it - personally I'd say it's good if you're 14, an aspiring "gangsta" and playing Grand Theft Auto when you should be at school, but for anyone else, give it a miss.
As a fan of innovative screenplay, hand-held cameras and gritty settings I should be sympathetic towards this film. It reminded me of a poor attempt between the Shield and Jean Luc Goddard's Breathless. Having now related those two brilliant titles to this makes me feel dirty... If you watch the film, you'll see what I mean with the whole film being done through hand-held camera with not one single establishing shot. This I can survive with for half an hour - but please... there has to be sometime to rest! The camera often tried to show off with some freezes and zooming in. Some showy angles and trying basically to be exciting. Often it seemed to much a student project but once in a while there was a good shot. Problem was with this, when one was found, the trick was abused and used over and over again. In some ways, it was like watching an advert with fast changes from angles and moments within a scene, dialogue being narrated much like one long incessant movie commercial for a film rather than a film itself. This concept never seemed to stop and became more confusing than flashy. These jump cuts being used like French New Wave on crack!
The soundtrack had some good samples. However, the problem lies there. They should have remained samples. Through the first 30 minutes, ten second samples were looped over and over in certain scenes. Changing to another sample for the next scene. In fact, the soundtrack NEVER stops. One scene is a bhangra sample on loop, next it's some gangsta rap. It's also louder than the speech. My thoughts for this were to fill the lack of dialogue and to cover it's poor content for when someone did say something.
The acting was waaaaay over the top. Not one actor held my attention, sympathy or drew any kind of interest. Many of the actors seemed to have little experience of acting to the point of being dragged off the street. The worst moment had to be the introduction to the Chinese boss. This was the only point where a soundtrack stopped... only replaced with an ambient tone... in an attempt to appear mystic and frightening, his accent was Oxbridge, but his overacting and whispering with little gestures were pretty cringe worthy. His bodyguards were the most disappointing - especially their dresscode which was probably attempting to be Matrix-esquire.
The realism is pretty poor without a doubt. Whether this was intentional, I am uncertain. Research into the subject is laughable. One thing that particularly bugged me was a character in almost every scene would have to have a gun as a prop at one point. Whether to caress, pull out and put on the table and shove in someone's face. Now, I'm not a gangster but surely some subtly is required. Maybe it's just to remind the audience we're looking at gangsters. Having said that, I did notice a blatant yet respectable homage to Scarface where a line of coke is done off the DVD box...
CGI and effects are non-existent. Clearly, this is a low budget film. So I wouldn't expect there to be. But one attempt at a gunshot when the bullet missed and hit the wall was embarrassing! The was a little fireball on the wall when the bullet hit which looked like a cartoon explosion from an old arcade game. On top of that, it was in colour. The rest of the film is in black and white.
Regarding the grainy black and white setting. A lot of people have been quite critical of this. Personally, like the concept of the film and some of it's ideas; it isn't bad. They're just done too many times, too blatantly and abused. Of course, this isn't the case with the black and white, since they've stuck to it. As a fan of New Wave, I would say black and white with a touch of grain deserves a nod every now and then; it's a great effect for a film. But unfortunately not to everyone's taste.
This film I'd say 2 stars. Maybe some people out there like watching it - personally I'd say it's good if you're 14, an aspiring "gangsta" and playing Grand Theft Auto when you should be at school, but for anyone else, give it a miss.