The Hooligan Factory

STAR RATING: ***** Saturday Night **** Friday Night *** Friday Morning ** Sunday Night * Monday Morning

Danny (Jason Meza) is the off-spring of his father, a once legendary football hooligan who has disappeared from his life. After being expelled from school and wanting more out of life, he crosses paths with Dex (Nick Nevern, also directing) another big name footie hooligan who's just been released from prison. Together, they go about re-uniting the old firm and trying to restore their former glory, but those days may be well behind them.

Even after they really ceased to hold their cult appeal, these British gangster/firm films still get put out a lot in the direct to DVD market, with a load of no name or little known actors in the lead role. So frequently do they appear, it seemed a fitting idea to make a film lampooning them all, and Nick Nevern's film is certainly thorough, sending up everything from Green Street, to more big time stuff like Goodfellas, only rarely to very funny result. It plays too much like a standard hooligan film, from the dialogue to the set up, and at times feels even more depressing than the usual such stuff.

Hyped up a fair bit by social media, with many of the cast and crew and their families allegedly behind it, it's all too evident why this enjoyed what could only have been the briefest of cinema visits. *

A week ago, just prior to the DVD/Blu-Ray release, this film had an average score of 7.1 on IMDb. Less than a week later, once people other than friends of the cast and crew have had a chance to actually see it, the average score is down to 5.1 I'd be very surprised if it doesn't sink a lot lower once more people watch it and start voting.

Note to self: in future check the number of votes before buying in to scores shown on IMDb as a good way to find under-rated gems on Blu-Ray! 7.1 for a movie I wouldn't give a 4 to!

It's interesting that Danny Dyer (who appears in the opening scene) and Ian Lavendar don't appear on the IMDb credits - are they too embarrassed to be associated with the end result? Dyer isn't even mentioned on the packaging - has his stock really fallen so low that they have to remove mention of him to avoid damaging sales?

The real problem here is the script. It's like something your mates would put together at school. Lead actor/director and co-writer Nick Nevern clearly has some talent - because the results are well-paced, stylish and convincingly (for the most part) decently acted - but script writing isn't one of them. I smiled twice during the whole movie (which, to be honest, is more than I expected given "the usual suspects" involved in this) but when the best "joke" is the white hero thinking his black son by a white wife is an "apple that doesn't fall far from the tree" it's obvious that whatever comedy is involved is all pretty jaded and desperate.

Ultimately you have to congratulate the marketing folk behind this. 7.1 on IMDb and the title is well stocked in the supermarkets in the week of release. When only two titles at most get the luxury of supermarket distribution in a week where some pretty good bona-fide films have been released, they've done incredibly well at grabbing an available slot. The asking price of £9.99 for the Blu-ray (including embossed slipcover) when most titles debut at £13 without a slipcover and £15 with a slipcover hints at the compromises that had to be made to persuade Sainsbury's et al to run with it.

But it's a depressing state of affairs when energy is being wasted on third-rate rubbish like this to the detriment of far better movies with far better talent involved (if you like East Enders you'll like this as the cast is mainly out-of-work former East Enders actors, all of whom presumably voted on here to get that 7.1 rating that the title had the day before it was released).

I'm not a fan of soccer/football but I know the insane nature of some of the "fans" and their proclivity to violence. But I also had the advantage of not knowing this was supposed to be a parody of the more serious hooligan genre that was popular at the time as I didn't watch any of those serious takes on the subject. For me it was just an absurdist take on the nature of such sporting fanatics who really are just there to fight and enjoy more the sport of beating each other senseless. So maybe I enjoyed it because I wasn't comparing it to anything. The characters were cartoonish and there was plenty of funny bits to keep me watching. The pacing was good and the production quality was admirable for such low-brow base humor. Performances were good as the characters really held up in my mind. You absolutely had to have gone it hating this movie to end up hating it in the end. It's silly, it's brutal, but it's just entertainment and I was entertained.

First of all, most of these user reviews are made by friends of the filmmakers ( Yes Lucas Penn, i'm talking to you. You're listed as one of the cast !!!!) These guys obviously want to make a good impression On Nick Nevern and Jason Maza but please. You are fooling no one The film just simply ain't that funny. don't waste your money. They're trying to do what Shaun of the Dead did for zombie movies but they have fallen flat on their muggy faces. They are obviously trying to get as many people to watch this by putting out a massive campaign on Twitter and Facebook but it is not enough to mask the fact that this film isn't as good as it should be

I don't usually review anything ever. Because most films are relatively reviewed fairly, bar the odd strange fanboy or the liberal lefty, fat pride, blue haired feminist that doesn't find anything funny because they're so uptight and scared to move without offending someone one shade darker than porcelain. The jokes are 85% hit 5 % cringe and 10% miss but all in all it's a funny comedy. The main lead is really perfect, I love how he sees everything that's clearly happening and everyone else is obvious to the obvious dilemmas and threats around themselves. It's not a perfect movie by any strstch of the imagination and I probably wouldn't have rated it so highly but I suppose I have tried to offset the negative reviews that have gave it a measly 1 star, for what reason?? Because the people that reviewed it have no sense of humour. Comedy's that get 5 stars or more are subjectively more like 10 star reviews because 50% of the population are miserable, politically correct, take a knee and bow to the establishment, 6 striped bow, pandering degenerates that don't want anything to do with the normal, backbone, cornerstones of the world. Believe what you want. Dont knock something because you hate white me .