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Green Street (2004)
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Elijah Wood wears his worried face throughout the feature debut of writer/director Lexi Alexander and with good reason. He plays an American journalism student who moves to London after being kicked out of Harvard, only to become a paid-up member of West Ham football hooligans, the Green Street Elite. The film does not focus so much on the fruits of violence but more on the fun and companionship. The worst acts, however, are left to the gangs — known as “firms” — who batter each other for territory and reputation. Wanting to be like Alan Clarke's The Firm but not quite managing it, Green Street's low production values and simplistic (not to say nonsensical) plot do it no favours at all. It relies on hackneyed camerawork, unsubtle use of music and predictable character turns to move the flimsy story along. While Wood has a part to get his teeth into, other actors are not as well served, most notably Claire Forlani who does her best in a thankless role as the dutiful mother/daughter/sister. Violence may make people band together as brothers, but it can certainly be portrayed to more powerful effect than here. KK
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| Contains swearing, violence. |
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Tell us what you think
Email us at rtfilmcomments@bbc.co.uk to tell us what you think of this film. Your comments may appear in Radio Times magazine.
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Running time
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109min
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Country of origin
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US / UK
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Genre
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Crime Drama
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Alternate title
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Green Street Hooligans,
Hooligans
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Original language
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English
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Screenplay
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Lexi Alexander, Dougie Brimson, Josh Shelov
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Theatrical distributor
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UIP
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UK cinema certificate
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18
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UK cinema release date
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September 2005
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Film certification logos reproduced by kind permission of BBFC |
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