Footsteps

Bloody, brutal and disturbingly beautiful, Footsteps' blend of taut psychological horror and unflinching graphic ultra-gore is definitely not for the squeamish. G.H. Evans's innovative thriller is infinitely clever (with artistic nods to Toshiaki Toyoda's Pornostar and flashes of the inimitable Takashi Miike at his darkest and most violent) but also visually gorgeous: the composition and imagery is beguilingly rich and compelling. In particular, the opening sequence ranks among the most uncomfortable and harsh beginnings to any movie I've seen and immediately draws the viewer into the grim world of Evans' nightmare urban dystopia.

The soundtrack suits the mood and visuals perfectly, matching ear-battering electronica to eye-watering gore and elegant, melancholic strings to passages of raw emotion, and occasionally interspersed with long moments of silence which serve to heighten the main character Andrew's obvious social isolation and introversion.

Evans' love for and expert knowledge of Japanese extreme movie-making has clearly informed Footsteps, and he has applied that dynamic to an inherently Western tale of societal breakdown, which will be familiar to anyone who lives in the UK in particular. The plot also faintly echoes Joel Schumacher's Falling Down as well as Martin Scorsese's seminal Taxi Driver, as a morality tale of an ordinary working joe who is given more than adequate incentive to revenge himself on society.

As for the performances, they are never anything less than intriguing and fully credible. Nicholas Bool is stunningly charismatic and powerful in the role of Andrew, portraying him as a somewhat sympathetic hero of sorts, an ingenue out of his depth in the criminal underworld, with just the right mix of aloofness and alienation: his lack of social skills is so accurate, it's almost painful to watch at times. Also of note is Mads Koudal, who delivers a superb, standout performance as the charmless, ruthless and utterly evil Paul.

Set in a clever and complex narrative structure of flashbacks and flashforwards (which occasionally recalls Japanese director Shinji Aoyama's equally intricate plotting), the story follows the failing fortunes of a depressed, uncommunicative young man named Andrew (Nicholas Bool), who is an unskilled factory worker by day and a lonely loser by night. He comes from a broken home - his mother died when he was young, and his father married a much younger woman - and has next to no emotional connection with his long-suffering girlfriend, Sera, who leaves him because he just won't talk to her.

It's not long before Andrew's fragile world is broken down even further by the death of his father, leaving him with no surviving family. The final straw comes at almost exactly the same time, when he is made redundant only days after his dad has died.

Reeling from this final tragedy, he goes home - but instead of unlocking the door and going inside to continue his life of loss, pain, being ground underfoot by Lady Luck, and honest graft being rewarded by nothing but poverty and misery, he makes a snap decision, he loses his last marble, and embarks on a very different life path indeed - one steeped in violence, rage and brutality.

In doing so, Andrew is discovered by a gang of snuff filmmakers, who organise and carry out real-life beatings, murders, sex and drugs, which they then capture on DV camera, and he begins his journey into the filthy underworld of criminal society - and into more danger than he could possibly ever have imagined.

Footsteps presents a disturbing portrait of a bleak, doomed society filled only with drudgery, the threat of imminent redundancy, living on or beneath the poverty line, joyless sex, vicarious thrills and the possibility that at any time, one might get one's head stove in with a baseball bat by someone with no motive other than to make money and get kicks out of your suffering. It's profoundly affecting and edgy, and will strike a deep chord with anyone who's ever felt that British society was going to the dogs thanks to binge drinking, late-night violence, the ever-darkening world of reality TV, and boredom. Yet in Evans' vision, even in the darkness there is still a glimmer of hope for redemption.

This brooding, nihilistic and enigmatic depiction of Britain's vile criminal underworld - or indeed, an extension of its mainstream Saturday night vicious chav culture, come to that - replete with sex, drugs, more drugs, in-your-face violence, amorality and no respect for human life is a highly accomplished and self-assured work and places G.H. Evans right at the forefront of young, cutting-edge British film-making.

As usual the cast and crew have written the first few reviews! I wonder why they bother when surely everybody by now knows that anything with a decent rating and a low number of votes must just be being pimped by the people who made it.

Please don't waste your time watching this total garbage. It looks like it was made by schoolkids. The violence is laughably badly done (think 8 year olds pretending to play war or something - punches that don't connect, blood out of a ketchup bottle, etc. etc.). The endless 'thoughtful' silences at least have the decency to let you know the film is going to be boring as hell within the first 10 minutes.

The camera work is awful, with the usual shaky-cam work trying to give it a gritty feel (I would suggest changing the sheets on your bed Mr Director - bound to be some grit floating about there), sometimes the main subject of a shot is out of focus while, for instance, a bus window frame is in focus... poor poor poor. If they can't even get the basic mechanics of film-making right it's no wonder the end result is a total waste of film, money, effort and more importantly the viewer's time.

Watching Battlefield Earth is a better use of your time.

When i was watching this film i thought that it was going to be yet another failed Britsh attempt at movie making, how wrong was I. The film is about Andrew who is a man that pushes everyone he loves away from him just to stop himself getting hurt again. The person playing Andrew is a young man called Nick Bool and his performance was outstanding. Andrew then meets two men who force people into a dark and depraved world. Andrew down on his luck with nothing going his way finds himself embroiled in a bitter world of dog eat dog. The subtle romantic pieces between Andrew and Sara make it a touching film that although violent never seems nihilistic. All the actors were very impressive, especially the person playing Andrews girlfriend Emma Powell, who was very good. And i must say a huge well done to everybody involed with this piece of work. Can't wait for the next one.

Painfully slow,amateurish and downright poorly acted first effort from a writer director who's clearly been renting Gaspar Noe/Toshiaki Toyoda style films out at blockbusters a long time. This as none of the wit originally or charm of other lower budget British directors like Simon Rumley or Chris Cooke. Save your time on this and go watch the likes of Red Road or This Is England.

Normally I'd be the 1st to give a first time writer/director a break, but its a shame we get sham reviewers building films up to be more than they are. In who's book honestly is this a 9 or 10 ? They are clearly insider comments/ratings, sad as I highly respect mandiapple having read her reviews for years, she's oddly been someone who's pointed me in the direction of the film makers who's style Footsteps is clearly trying to emulate.

For me I'd of most likely given this film a 4 for a nice first attempt but to balance the way off other ratings its getting a 2. I do hope you come back soon Gareth, hopefully you could learn one big lesson with this first feature and try make the people in front of the camera feel more comfortable, that way the viewer would feel more comfy and be able to enjoy the film.

This film is noteworthy for being the directorial debut of Gareth Evans, best know for making the "Raid" films a few years after this. This film is something totally different.

It's a very low-budget crime film. It's very amateurish. The acting is pretty bad, with one notable exception. And the movie sounds terrible. The audio is very bad for the duration of the film, peaking all over the place and cutting in and out, which makes this very difficult and frustrating to watch. It's almost a chore for that reason. When sound is done well in a movie, it goes unnoticed by most. That's the goal. Here, however, it is all too noticeable and a constant distraction and hindrance. It makes the film feel like a rough cut, like it's unfinished.

It even feels like there are some scenes missing. I understand that they didn't want to spoon-feed us every answer here, but it feels like some stuff was unintentionally left out, as if they never got around to shooting it or just tired or ran out of time or money and gave up.

Apart from that, however, the story is actually decent. And the camerawork is fun. They really made the most out of their low-quality digital camera gear. The video editing is well-done as well. You can sort of see hints of things to come in this early film of his. Notably, the action and violence pretty well done compared to the more lacking dramatic moments, so it's no surprise Evans would go on to focus on more action-heavy films.

Additionally, the filmmakers made use of some pretty good locations for such a low budget film. They got creative when they had to, and it really pays off here. Overall, this film feels a bit like Christopher Nolan's "Following," except with really bad audio and not nearly as much of that low-budget charm.

Also worth mentioning are a few very fun, original parts that are like nothing I've seen anywhere else. Most of these take place during the film's climax, which is fun but still sounds just as bad as the rest of the film. There are three or four of these moments, and they're really wonderful, gritty, brutal and strange moments that almost make the whole experience worthwhile.

The film is highly flawed, but I think that its makers really learned something from it. I think it's thanks to this film that Evans was able to make a better film the next time around, and then an even better one after that. He's learned a lot and come a long way.