South West Nine
***
Cinema
Releases - October 12, 2001
Certificate 18. 90 minutes. Directed by Richard
Parry. Written by Steve North, Richard Parry. Starring Wil Johnson, Orlessa
Edwards, Frank Harper, Stuart Laing.
"South West Nine" is a surprisingly
entertaining British movie that intercuts different groups of characters
as they go about small-time criminal business on a weekend for which a massive
anti-capitalist protest has been scheduled. That description might be misleading,
because the movie is not at all perceptive about London or its criminals,
and nor does it take a single position on any social issue. It's entertaining
fluff nonetheless.
One group of characters includes a guy trying
to organise a rave in an abandoned church and buy enough drugs to sell at
the function; he's accompanied by a buddy who was supposed to help him with
the project but is out of commission after accidentally dipping his hands
in acid -- instead of serving as a business associate, the guy is trying
to pet imaginary animals. In another part of town resides a heroin dealer
who wants to get his courier more heavily involved in the business -- but
the courier has a conscience and a bible-bashing grandmother, and would rather
get into another line of work altogether. There's also a squatter who has
stolen the briefcase of a bank executive, which happens to contain a CD-Rom
relating to illegal corporate arms deals.
"South West Nine" is as much comedy as drama,
using all the above as texture rather than substance. The director, Richard
Parry, is more concerned with energetic filmmaking than meaningful storytelling,
and his screenplay is bizarrely and shamelessly cobbled together from elements
of two other movies -- "Go", the Doug Liman comedy about low-rent drug dealers
doing the rounds of the rave scene, and "Strange Days", which intercuts illicit
underground culture with socially significant events and also involves a
disc that could expose high-level corruption.
Not that I'm criticising Parry. "South West Nine"
is well-crafted, and the specific depictions of its particular characters
end up rather involving. This is a fun film, even though we can see the
joins.
COPYRIGHT©
2001 Ian Waldron-Mantgani
2001 Reviews
(alphabetical)
2001 Reviews (by star
rating)
Archive of all cinema reviews
(alphabetical)
Review Archive
Index
UK
Critic main page
|
![[Image]](http://www.ukcritic.com/posbanr2.gif)