In the same style as Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, The Essex Boys is based loosely on a true story. The Rettendon Range Rover Murders left three men dead, two serving life imprisonment and another living under an assumed identity. The premise of a true story and the intended style are a good place to start, but this film doesn’t quite make it. It fails to deliver on the humour side and comes across more as a made for television film with lots of violence, Cockney accents and swearing thrown in to attract the punters. This doesn't make it a bad film, just not necessarily what was expected.
| "Good ‘ere, ‘innit?!" |
Billy Reynolds (Charlie Creed-Miles) is working for a local taxi cab service in Essex. He is always looking for some excitement and a quick way to make some extra dosh. Jason Locke (Sean Lord of the Rings Bean) has just been released from prison and employs Billy to be his driver. Jason has obviously not been rehabilitated and quickly seeks out a way to get back on his feet illegally. His plan is to take control of security at the nightclubs in Southend, as whoever controls security also controls the sale of illegal drugs within that club.
With his former colleagues he sets about creating this power struggle. His long suffering wife Lisa (Alex ER Kingston) is by his side, being a good wife and doing what she is told. After yet another embarrassing moment with another woman at a party and a beating for daring to question her husband, Lisa takes a liking to Billy. Whether this is through lust or revenge is not known, but the danger is imminent.
The cast is the most attractive feature of this film. Sean Bean demonstrates his talent well here as the psychotic and driven Jason. The lead character of Billy is also played well by Creed-Miles, an unknown who looks to have a decent future in film. The surprise here for me was Alex Kingston as Lisa. She looked rather familiar throughout and it took some time to recognise her from her role on ER as Dr Elizabeth Corday. Although the film is more recent than her role on ER, she looks younger and even performs a full frontal nude scene. The rest of the cast will be familiar to most also and play their roles well.
The plot proceeds at a reasonable pace and has plenty of twists and turns along the way to keep the viewer entertained. It is well filmed and directed and has all the violence and language one would expect. The only thing really lacking here is the humour so familiar with British gangster films. Not a bad film by any means, but if you are expecting Lock, Stock or Snatch then you will only partially get what you expected. Mind you, take a look at the copious amounts of crap currently on our DVD rental shelves and this could well be the right choice for your evening’s viewing.
Presented in an aspect ratio of 1.85:1 and not 16:9 enhanced, the quality of this transfer is decent without being spectacular. Picture is sharp throughout with no sign of grain. Detail is also good and as much of the film is shot in dimly lit scenarios, this is a relief. Colours are strong and well saturated and blacks are deep. There are occasional film artefacts and aliasing, but many of these pass without notice if you are not looking for them. There is no layer change as this is a single layer disc and subtitles are supplied in the singular English for the Hearing Impaired. Many viewers will need this as the accents are quite strong at times.
Audio is supplied in English Dolby Digital 5.1 surround and it does quite a decent job. Being a dialogue driven film the majority of sound is kept across the front channels. The surrounds are only really called into action for music ambience and the occasional directional effect. This is not a major problem though, as this type of film doesn’t demand an audio overdose. Dialogue is clear at all times (if you can understand the accents) and there are no synch problems.
The Essex Boys is definitely worth a rental, but be prepared for a film that will hold no punches. It will entertain, make you think and shock you, but sadly it won't make you laugh too much - we can't have everything can we? The extras are minimal, but picture and sound are of decent enough quality to make this worth a look.
