Review of London to Brighton (2006) by Sean H — 08 Aug 2008

A GRITTY drama about some very sordid goings-on, writer-director Paul Andrew Williams' London To Brighton revels in the darker side of life but lacks the killer punch to break through to a mass audience.

Starting with dramatic confusion at 3am in a run-down toilet and ending in guns, death and grave-digging 24 hours later, the film tells of street prostitute Kelly (Lorraine Stanley) and her increasingly desperate attempts to protect 11-year-old Joanne (Georgia Groome) from the gangsters and pimps who have procured her to sexually service a crime kingpin.

But, despite a convincing performance from Stanley as the bruised and brow-beaten heroine, it's difficult to care about the characters in any way. The baddies - with the exception of Sam Spruell's icy villain-in-chief - are off-the-shelf cockney mobsters and the action - especially an infuriating interlude with a houseload of sketchily presented Brighton slackers - lacks impetus.

Only the climactic scene - with Spruell scarily ordering his latest victims to literally dig their own graves - shows the kind of flair that this kind of lowlife saga really needs to engage the hearts and minds of an audience.