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How entertaining? ★☆☆☆☆
Thought provoking? ★☆☆☆☆ 1 March 2015
This article is a review of HYENA. |
“Why don’t you go f** yourself Tintin?” Keith (Tony Pitts) to Nick Taylor (Richard Dormer)
If it wasn’t for the likes of actors Neil Maskell (UTOPIA) and Stephen Graham (BOARDWALK EMPIRE), this would be the sort of Brit gangster garbage that you could pick up at a petrol station for a couple of quid. Arguably almost fascistic in its treatment of women and foreigners, it is hard to fathom any kind of merit to HYENA. A rarity. For all of AMERICAN SNIPER’s profound flaws, and deeply disturbing propaganda, at least Clint Eastwood can construct a sequence. That cannot be said for writer-director Gerard Johnson. Having your camera trail behind your lead, back of head too often in view, is the purview of the inexperienced filmmaker. Every strand of greasy mulletted protagonist Michael (Peter Ferdinando) should be etched into the mind of the audience by the end.
If it wasn’t for the likes of actors Neil Maskell (UTOPIA) and Stephen Graham (BOARDWALK EMPIRE), this would be the sort of Brit gangster garbage that you could pick up at a petrol station for a couple of quid. Arguably almost fascistic in its treatment of women and foreigners, it is hard to fathom any kind of merit to HYENA. A rarity. For all of AMERICAN SNIPER’s profound flaws, and deeply disturbing propaganda, at least Clint Eastwood can construct a sequence. That cannot be said for writer-director Gerard Johnson. Having your camera trail behind your lead, back of head too often in view, is the purview of the inexperienced filmmaker. Every strand of greasy mulletted protagonist Michael (Peter Ferdinando) should be etched into the mind of the audience by the end.
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Opening on Michael receiving a call as he overlooks London has one hark back to the opening of DRIVE; not positively mind. Cinematography is not in that league. Picking up fellow wide-boys – Martin (Maskell), Keith and Chris (Gordon Brown – not the UK former Prime Minister, unfortunately) – they don police caps and raid one of the worst movie nightclubs this reviewer can remember. Later on, the action takes us to a strip club/brothel, and then a police station. They all look like a community centre hired at the last minute and set-decorated with whatever was to hand. Lack of immersion in a criminal world is rarely as laughably budget on the silver screen.
Back to that nightclub, the foursome beat up the patrons for no apparent reason (are we meant to be in A CLOCKWORK ORANGE territory?), to a montage of dance music. One lost count at the number of such time-filling sequences liberally sprinkled. Turns out the rubbish-looking cop baseball hats are meant to be real; these four are a corrupt vice taskforce. Vic Mackey’s crew in THE SHIELD had charisma and shades of grey. HYENA’s bunch range from the racist to the unsalvageably immoral. Success rate reputation, among colleagues, is not played out in the runtime as they lad about ineptly.
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Michael’s world is meant to close around him, à la PUSHER, as he deals with Turkish and Albanian drug dealers and people traffickers. We are meant to ask, whom can he trust as he gets sucked further in? Instead, the question raised is: Why is it taking nearly two hours for this douche to get his comeuppance? Characters, ranging from superiors and internal investigators to criminals, act sans logic. Then there’s the denouement, ending artily abruptly, devoid of resolution. More films should have such chutzpah, but here it feels disjointed. Maybe the production ran out of money? As an affecting portrayal of metropolis decay, HYENA does not deliver.
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