Review of Essex Boys (2000) by Martin M — 08 Dec 2009
This abrasive British gangster epic set in Essex, a county due east of London, thrives on double-crosses galore. None of the characters are role models, much less noble, and they live to get to the top of their rackets.
The English accents are not that thick, but you may not be able to make it through this thoroughly unsavory crime thriller. Ostensibly, the story is told by an enterprising cabdriver named Billy Reynolds (Charlie Creed-Miles) who gets mixed with with ex-convicts Jason Locke (Sean Bean of GOLDENEYE) and John Dyke (Tom Wilkinson of RUSH HOUR) who are in the cutthroat narcotics smuggling business.
They are smuggling pills that they refer to as spotted dogs, or in non British dialect is ecstasy. Locke mistreats his wife, Lisa Locke (Alex Kingston of ER) and openly has sex with any tart to whom he takes a fancy.
Director Terry Winsor and scenarist Jeff Pope based this 102-minute, R-rated thriller on the notorious Rettendon Range Rover Murders," where authorities discovered three gangsters gunned down and left for dead shot in a Range Rover during one snowy evening.
This scene is easily the best and the filmmakers good job of foreshadowing it. Meanwhile, Billy proves his worth as a driver and Dyke loans him to loose cannon hood Jason Locke who has no qualms about throwing people out of windows or strangling uncooperative girls that refuse to let him have his way with them.
Action develops gradually with less characters winning in the end over the crazed Locke. Winsor handles things nicely enough and the ending is truly a revelation along with Alex Kingston's role as Locke's wife.
Not as charismatic as LOCK, STOCK, AND TWO BARRELS or for that matter any of the other Guy Ritchie crime melodramas. The moral is obvious: do not associate with shady characters who use guns to settle their arguments and are forever paranoid about witnesses to the massacres they have seen.
Sean Bean blows everybody away with his hard-as-nail performance gangster who can never assuage his greed.
This review of Essex Boys (2000) was written by Martin M on 08 Dec 2009.
Essex Boys has generally received positive reviews.
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