Once Upon a Time in London

IMDB is sadly becoming known for fake ratings. This film is one big bag of gangster film cliches from one scene to the next. It lacks a compelling story (which is a shame considering it's based on real gangsters) and I could care less about the main characters. Don't waste your time with this. Stick to football hooligan or Guy Ritchie flicks if you want to see a halfway entertaining film about English gangsters.

I was trying to understand how this movie got such a high rating, and can't. Math doesn't seem to add up! Movie itself was "bleah". Wasted time.

Billy Hill is a forgotten legend. This film doesn't do him justice. His achievements as a gangster were unsurpassed. Post office robbery, gold bullion robbery diamond mining in SA. Plus he was one that got out at the right time. Film doesn't go deep enough. Just to much knifing and fighting. Billy, Jack and Albert were intelligent crooks. That used their environment to earn. Billy Hill book is a lot better than this bubble gum.

Acting and photography in this flick is a very high standard. Dark but lovely and polished. All this counts for nothing though as it's let down by a story that's so disjointed you realise you stopped caring earlier on. The first part of the film I thought was a clever use of some cool cinematic style of weaving stories together. If I put the effort in to keep track, it would pay off as the film went on. But no. There's no story, just things that happen. It's full of pointless dead end scenes. Gangster one beats up gangster two who then beats up gangster one etc and on occasion a random moll appears and disappears. No character background or development either. They start off bad and, well, stay bad and carry on doing things that they did at the start of the film. Two hours....two hours of my life!! I suppose I'm optimistic and waited for that "ah, I get it" moment that was never going to come.

This could have been so much better why on earth do they not hire a decent continuity director. It's so fractious and chops from scene to scene with little explanation. It's like they left a quarter of it on cutting floor what a pity