The Firm

Like a lot of people, when I first heard the news that Nick Love was "updating" the original version of The Firm I anticipated the worst. My objection lay not so much in the fact it was a remake of a classic film, but more as to why we needed yet another film centering on football hooliganism.

The argument that such material merely glamorizes the violence it depicts, (appealing as it does to a section of youth that also worship the fashion and lingo of the genre) is without question. The worst example of which (and still prominent in most bargain bins of HMV up and down the land) would be the truly execrable "Green Street". A film so inept in its plotting, acting and overall plausibility that you'd be forgiven for thinking the whole thing had been stitched together by a gang of football thugs themselves.

Contrary to what director Lexi Alexander may think, this was a film that at every opportunity served to heighten the voyeuristic delight of its male, teenage demographic. Self conscious fight sequences shot through with booming dance interludes, whilst a preoccupation with all things bloody gave way to an orgiastic ending which was more like a scene from Braveheart than a realistic portrayal of football mob violence.

Which brings us back to Love and The Firm. What immediately strikes here, as it does in "Goodnight Charlie Bright", and "The Football Factory" is the skill and accuracy with which Love conveys his subject matter.

The film is also a far warmer and optimistic piece than anything Love has made so far. Central character "Dominic" shares an all too believable rapport with his father, forever wrangling money from him, whilst both parents playfully tease him throughout the film - trying their best not to cramp his style when a friend catches Dom at his local sports store.

It is this held focus on the family, combined with the way in which Dominic is positioned when the violence first unfolds (felled by a single punch and then little more than a terrified witness for the remainder of the film)that make for a clear mission statement on the behalf of the director.

The scenes of violence here must also be commended for their reserve and authenticity. Thanks to Love's impeccable eye for the 1980s, the sense of watching a documentary on football violence runs close at times, with the camera skittering about to capture snatches of fight that never quite take off as quite accurately, the police intervene - with their standard uniform and makeshift formation, capturing them in flux before the later arrival of CCTV and full riot gear.

This lends real tension to these scenes. Yet Love has no agenda here other than to show how quickly such altercations are broken up and how they often amount to little more than benign screaming matches. Even the more "laddish" Football Factory tended not to dwell on the full scale chaos between its football gangs and Love has clearly kept this in mind with The Firm.

It must be said however, that the film hardly breaks new territory. (within what is already a very limited genre) Though there is no question that the look and feel of the era has been captured brilliantly and that as top boy "Bex" Paul Anderson is suitably charged, with its rather obvious ending - an eye for an eye simply meaning someone will end up losing their head, it is at least a refreshing twist to see Love's championing of the values of friends and family over the raging poison of the hooligans themselves.

Nick Love's films are not about football violence, they are about men. They ask the question, how do boys become men in a world where the men around them are dysfunctional, often abused and abusive, or in the case of our public figures, corrupt? His films often use the back drop of the football tribe (gang), where it is understood, you can at once lose yourself and find an instant identity, but at what cost? The men in Nick Loves films are always flawed & struggling to find their place in a world that regards their attitude and energies as irrelevant, and as a result they are drawn, by the perceived excitement and glamour, into the bosom of the street gang.

At the core of many of our social ills are dysfunctional men, failing themselves & us on a daily basis. This self hatred, often intensified by drink or drugs, is channelled back at society in many forms, often violent. Nick Love's films open up this world of male adversarial culture and expose it to the sun light. With an uncompromising swagger and flare, he addresses often distasteful issues that are very present, to a greater or lesser degree, all around us and many young men have to face on a daily basis. In fact one of the reasons Nick Loves films manage to gain finance, is that he is always aware of his audience and as a result has built a loyal following that feel understood by a British film maker.

It is lazy not to understand the themes Nick Love is trying to explore, and too easy to join the band wagon of criticism, which in many ways mimics the criticism boys & men face through out their life, as their energies are misunderstood. Far better to welcome the maturing of a talent, and to support and celebrate a British film maker, who is still managing to use the canvas of film to explore themes that are universal, and as relevant today as they were in the 1980s.

Nick Love however, is not Alan Clarke and his subjects, although similar, are very different. Alan Clarke's main thesis was political and his original film was written in a time that saw the working class being remodelled along Thatcherite principles. Clarke & Hunter perceived the football 'thugs' as an extension of the selfish yuppie, that became detached from the traditional community and was looking for a home and found football. While it cannot be denied that the political pressures and unrest of the Thatcher period were profound, and gave rise to a number of dispossessed subcultures, Nick Love's film operates in a world of the personal, not political. His film feels written from the inside out, not the other way round. Gone are the endless scenes debating the rights and wrongs of football violence, which felt heavy with the hand of the filmmaker, and in comes a confident understanding of the world of the story. Free from this pressure to explain the terms of the genre, Love's film becomes about belonging, about the excitement and rituals of the tribe. Whether thematically this is better or worse is one of personal preference, suffice to say, it would have been deeply misguided for Love to have attempted to voice Clarkes themes, which although potent, feel redundant from this point in history.

One could argue that Clarke & Hunters original film failed to fully understand the subculture they used as their political vehicle. In one of the final scenes of the original 'Firm', a minor characters says to a documentary crew,''..its not about the football, we would organize around darts if we could'' .. this has been shown through study to be incorrect. No other sport has thrown up such a subculture as 'Football Hooligans'. It is tribal and deeply rooted, as in the case of Milwall & West Ham, in years and years of territorial and geographical rivalry. Football violence existed long before Clarke or Love, what happened in the 1980s, is it became highly organized, and as Love correctly identifies in his film, it became 'fashionable'. Nick Love's 'The Firm' understands this and in many ways is a truer representation of this phenomenon.

There are a handful of British film makers working today, that are able to explore issues which go to the heart of our culture, within a global multiplex environment . Like it or loath it, Nick Love reaches out and provides a voice to a disaffected , often working class audience, and does this against enormous odds, not least, the middle class critical establishment.

There are two major factors that separate Nick Love's reimagining of his football hooligan film The Firm from Alan Clarke's original 1988 television play: the first is a perspective change from the point of view of the repulsive yet compelling character Bex (played in this version by Paul Anderson, who does a fair job of imitating Gary Oldman but doesn't bring anything new to the table), to that of whiny, annoying, dry-lunch Dom who just appears to exist in every scene he's in. The second difference is that it's not very good. Love's direction is the epitome of style over substance, opting for an over-stylised imagining of 1980s Britain complete with neon lights, a nostalgic soundtrack, and a never-ending slew of tracksuits that look like they were produced in a Haribo factory. The script is also significantly lighter with several comic relief moments scattered around an otherwise dark story. While this may make for a more visually appealing and accessible film, it loses the savagery and sense of urgency that Clarke's original had. It also doesn't help the film that Love seems to be aware that his screenplay is inferior to the source material, with key scenes from the original being replicated seemingly beat for beat and inserted clumsily into the narrative when it begins to falter. Aside from Paul Anderson's Bex, none of the performances are particularly standout, with Daniel Mays completely wasted as Bex's rival, Yeti, who is more or less completely side-lined throughout the film. Overall, Love's remake is an ambitious attempt to update a somewhat dated story for a contemporary audience which ultimately hits the goalposts.

So far, the film is a bit clichéd and over the top but there is a good deal of warmth and humour love brings to the film. Though I have not seen the original, nick love efforts should not go unnoticed as a director.

Despite Nick Love being the most criticised film director working in Britain today his remake of THE SWEENEY has topped the UK film this week . Of course the fact that it's made a million quid at the box office is probably down to the title . If the film was called RAY WINSTIONE PLAYING HIMSELF SORTING OUT SOME NAUGHTY CRIMINALS it probably wouldn't have been such a success but hey there's nothing like a little cynicism if only to irritate and annoy the luvvie film critics who can't get enough poncy art house cinema. This film a remake of the highly regarded Alan Clarke drama from 1989 is a previous attempt to be cynical

Clarke was along with Loach and Leigh the master of British realist cinema . Wisely Love decides not to follow this type of directing style . Instead he shoots a movie that has a wonderful rich look. The cinematography by the ironically named Matt Gray gives the impression that we're seeing an up and coming Roger Deakins in action and one wonders why Gray is confined to television . It's the cinematography that will be your abiding memory of this film

The problem is that while you're watching the film and old enough to remember the 1980s you'll be forever scratching your head wondering what year it's set in . Characters walk around in shell suits which were once considered to be cool in about 1989 or 1990 . Likewise the hairstyles indicate that it's 1989-90 when the first film was set . But this illusion is contradicted by the musical soundtrack with artists likeSoft Cell , Tears For Fears and The Rock Steady Crew which gives the impression it's 1983 or 84 at the latest . Indeed there's a TV report that Leon Brittain is home secretary which means it's set in 1983-85 . As someone who was a teenager in this period let me tell you now there's no way anyone would have a shell suit or that type of hairstyle in the early to mid 1980s . These anachronistic aspects are totally distracting . This is a pity because it tends to ruin the first half of the movie . The second half does borrow heavily from the original teleplay but no doubt anyone who can remember the original will say the original was better and harder hitting

This is a great shame because it's something of a brave decision by Love to retell the story from the point of view from Dom who was a relatively minor character from the 1989 FIRM . Cynics might say that's because there's no way someone of Love's reputation could get someone of the stature of an up and coming Gary Oldman to carry the film as the main character , can you imagine Danny Dyer as Bex ! . As it stands it's a much better looking and better made film than Love's 2007 effort OUTLAW and is fairly watchable