Shank [2010] [DVD]

This was a let down. I had really high hopes for this and I was definitely DUPED by the box cover. I thought it said from the DIRECTOR who brought you Kidulthood and Adulthood and so was very keen on the film as both these films are amazing and all the more so dfor the gifted director/actor/scriptwriter in them. However... it's ver dodgy as what it says is the film is from the DISTRIBUTOR who brought you those films. So what? Who cares about Distribution? It's not going to effect the quality of script or photography or actors is it? They definitely did this on purpose and like a mug I was sucked in.
To show you how bad the film was though, I was only a quarter the way through before I started thinking how bad the film was and I really couldn't get my head around the difference in quality and knew something was wrong and hence picked the box up and re-read it and discovered my mistake.
So what's up with the film then? Well it's pretty dire acting. Unfortunately the young star of the film is too young. You know when you see schoolkids in school plays and how they rush their lines and think that the way to emote anger, stress, passion etc. is to shout everything .... Yup he does all this. Someone should have coached him better.
Next is the theme and construction of the script. The basis is the kid goes on a tour of London trying to get help and sanction to kill the murderer of his brother who's also a member of another gang. It's here that you get the impression the story isn't cohesive and it seems to be a set of sub themes bolted together that don't merge very well. For example the meeting with Whisper another London mini-Don is really badly put together and the DJ featured in the nightclub scene must have been promised they'd play his whole song because it's dire, adds nothing to the story or atmosphere and it goes on and on like a mini showcase. Very bad and obvious what's happening. The whole thing is pretty badly done with a lot of initial experimentation of camera angles and lighting but after 20 mins or so it settles down and the film becomes watchable. The film never moves from poor and is below average. If you appreciate the review then please vote and keep the voting system alive please. Thanks.

I was expecting a gritty film and gritty is largely what you get. Beyond that the screen play appears to have been written by one of the more neanderthall characters it seeks to portray.

Poorly written with a storyline that would have no difficulty in being written twice on half a postage stamp, mostly one dimensional acting at best there was so very little to involve the audience here. Even my 15 year old son thought this one of the worst films he had seem and he appears capable of tolerating a high level of gangsta drivel.

The attempts at Tarentino were laughable and meaningless with anime cuts serving no appreciable purpose. I would have at the very least expected a decent dub step based soundtrack but that seemed absent as well.

This film fails to engage at the most basic level. Perhaps it should be returned to the cutting room floor and reworked as a dark comedy but then it would have to find wit and a modicum of intelligence from somewhere. This was a film that is the DVD first for me to have found its way into the bin within minutes of the credits rolling at the end.

This is a truely bad film presumably marketed at an audience of the gangs it depicts and those who want to be in them. My advice is - Avoid like the plague !

well just watched SHANK, i was expecting something on parr with adult/kidulthood but it was way below that class. Deacon as always is a top actor, didnt like the main character junior.