Blitz

Alright. So. Hmmm.

First off, we have Aiden Gillen. He is a serial killer who's decided to kill a bunch of coppers in Southeast London. That actually overstates the issue; we're not talking about a sermonising madman in the Kevin Spacey in Seven mould. Rather, then than call him a serial killer, he's basically just an arsehole. A violent arsehole with a chip on his shoulder. So, he's off on a killing spree to kill some coppers.

Now, as you are probably well aware, the Police in the UK, especially in the Met are all wide eyed innocents, utterly lacking in street smarts, and complete strangers to the ways of violence, which makes them basically helpless targets. That is all but Jason Statham, who's an old school copper who wishes he was Gene Hunt but hasn't the material. He's on notice for having beaten up three young thugs robbing a car, which the papers have blown up into a police brutality thing. And in fairness, it *was* a police brutality thing, but the youths were more armed than the paper suggested.

Anyway, in light of this idiot on the loose killing coppers, Statham is put on the case, under newly promoted Inspector Paddy Considine, who's a gay officer who's previously had a lot of hassle from fellow officers for being gay.

And the hunt is on.

I wanted to really like this film, because the idea is basically what's happened earlier in the month with Attack The Block; take a trad standard eighties US B-Movie plot (in this case, renegade cop vs sociopathic killer) and give it a smart, lo-fi, British makeover. But sadly, while they nailed the lo-fi and the British bit, unlike Attack The Block, this film falls woefully short on the Smarts. For instance, without giving much away, part way through the film we have the standard trope of "cops know they have their man, but have insufficient evidence to charge, so have to free him." Fair enough. Except that sitting there in the cinema, I could see that there was something they could *easily* have used to charge him with, a piece of physical evidence which he had on him when they arrested him, and which they gave back to him when they released him. I mean, for god's sake, did nobody making the film even notice that? And this point should be regarded as illustrative of a generally slapdash plot.

So, while I really would have liked the film they probably *hoped* they were making, unfortunately, the script wasn't up to the job in either the plot or dialogue departments. Performance wise, everyone does the best they can with the material they're given; Statham is Statham, and faintly pissed off as usual. Gillen is a convincing petty psycho who thinks he's a genius, and Considine is great as a just slightly fey gay man, who's still hard as nails where it counts. That much, we can enjoy, and prevent the film being a complete waste of time, but it's a pretty flawed and rickety structure overall.