The Sweeney

The dialogue was fine and the acting was fine, but I don't believe that an elite police squad, even London police, can be so incompetent.

Is it realistic that a group of police trained in the use of firearms should not actually be any good in shooting those firearms? The action scenes remind me of the old TV show, "The A-Team", where guns are blazing but no one seems to get hurt. Or, rather, it would, except that the bad guys have apparently been paying attention at the firing range. Surely in a real police organization, people who couldn't shoot straight, whose tactics were amateurish, who had no regard for public safety, and who had difficulty with the idea of calling for backup, should not be allowed out on the streets. More than that, I find it incomprehensible that a training program would be allowed to exist that produced such people as the end result.

As fine as the actors are, this movie does no credit to the UK police service.

Would love to give this good ratings, was hoping to.. But.

Opening scene was beyond stupid. The bit in the middle was daft as hell.

And the less said about the ending the better.

Great acting, just very poor script and the director should go back to film school.. (does a director not have any control??)

Note to writer/director.. Never give that kind of daft opening if you want to be taken seriously..

Or daft ending..

Or daft middle bit...

Having never lived in England, I never got to see the television show that inspired this movie, so I can't comment on how faithful this adaptation is to the source material. I will say, however, that there were a few points in the movie when the movie seemed to assume you knew the source material, since these points were vague and not really explained. But before I go on listing this movie's faults, I will mention what I thought was positive about it. The movie looks very good for a budget that was reportedly only around three million pounds. There are a couple of good action sequences. Also, the acting by everyone is pretty good. However, the actors are a bit *too* good at their job, because no character in the movie is likable. The main problem, however, is with the script. The script has the one-two punch of the story not only moving quite slowly, but being extremely familiar, especially if you have seen as many direct-to-DVD movies as I've seen. The movie could have been much worse, but that's no excuse to track down and watch it.

I'd looked forward to this having missed it in the cinema, I was a big fan of the TV series and may have expected much more. It was a terrible disappointment. The action was OK, the script; well let's just say they must have had space left on the envelope. It was mostly dull and unbelievable even in an action movie, were some suspension of reality must be given. Some of the acting was dreadful, at best wooden, the shooting, the proverbial barn door would be safe. I'm a fan of Ray, in this he was miscast and wasted, it might have made an acceptable television pilot I'm now not sure if it was worth the rental, maybe just.3/10

Unbelievable tosh throughout. Terrible plot and acting, attempted style and no content. The soundtrack bleared all the way through which was the best thing as it covered the characters. Ray Winston is one dimensional - watch him as Henry viii - "I wanna ave a san" LOL. Repulsive sex story between Winston and a female cop. Carter was played by a plank. The Sweeney in the Met could not exist as portrayed in this day and age - 70s is where is belongs and trying to update it was a total failure in all departments. If is wasn't on free TV I wouldn't have watched it and I only continued to view it because it was so abysmally boring and amusing.