Music video guys (both white) try to direct a narrative movie, choose a subject that they clearly no nothing about or have any experience of. Film looks good, starts well, then slowly it becomes clear that the central relationship of the film is paper thin, under developed and badly realised, the runaway couple don't seem to be a couple at all, no sense of love or that they even actually know each other, and then it descends into a honour killing narrative, where nobody involved rings the police, and about 50 people are involved in this (some are white.......). Credibility zero. Writers picked the subject, treated it with no depth, then didn't know what to do with it at all, or how to actually write, or how to end what they choose as a story. The film reaches for importance when but is totally hamstrung by bad writing.
Fizzles to zero in the last half hour. Disappears up its own bum might be another description. No ending, a cop out.
Some decent scenes, which work, some good new actors and nice cinematic locations. Some of it seems well directed at the start especially. Good camera work too. BUT Without a proper story or real characters, by the end it's like a .... Well, a music video.
Director has an eye. Simple fix next time is to Hire a scriptwriter who can tell stories properly. Part of the blame should go to the BFI and lottery types who funded this and signed off on the shoddy script, badly realised characters and the ropey treatment of the serious subject.
Director never made another film, but may have learned good shots and visuals on their own, don't equal a proper story / characters. Missed opportunity. Potentially worth seeing, just don't expect it to work. The Raul Moat joke was good, and Barry and some of the lads seemed authentic, more so than the overall story/scenes.
