Essex Boys: Law of Survival

Law of Survival proved me wrong by showing me that you can re-enact a script on an incredibly low shoestring budget and at least recollect some dignity from an appalling product that was Hooligans At War.

Law of Survival is by no means perfect, far from, there are still problems with the camera work and quality that make me wonder if Poundland are currently having a half-price sale on with a free lighting system!

The film seems to jump between a higher quality camera and a second B camera that looks like a very cheap hand-held or low-end product, this mild annoyance is only exaggerated by choppy, un-explained and amateur editing but it's easily over-looked once you start getting into the story.

To start off I am a big fan of all films old,new,bad and good....But this is just beyond belief. It is so bad I do not know where to start!!??. The acting is horrendous , camera work shocking and directing .. abysmal. I think, reading between the "lines" (lol) it was trying to be a Lock Stock Style film....but what a failure. The accents where a joke. Watch out for the amateur acting as if they are waiting for each others line and not sure whos next....poor director?

The fight scenes are farcical...note the police one at the start in the yard. I have always looked at the rating scores here for films but now I seriously have grave doubts. Every review was about 1 or 2.....one critic put it at 5 stars!...yeh right! How the hell did it get its rating of 5.5+. Lot of false reviews here me thinks. AVOID please.

Shocking dialogue and acting, with no redeeming features whatsoever. The fight scenes are dreadful, the sound is dreadful, the plot is dreadful and the cast are dreadful. Gunfire sounds like firecrackers and the dialogue sounds as if the actors were making it up as they went along. Fight scenes are comedic, in that there is no rehearsed moves and sound effects, so all you get is a few grunts here and there and screwed up noses. The budget for this movie must have been around a hundred quid. Wardrobe looks limited to Sue Ryder, especially the bald 'heavy', who clearly drew the short-straw when it came to attire! It really boils down to a gangster war consisting of about ten people - 'very scary'. Nothing about this film is believable, from the ridiculous opening scenes, where we see two gangs of over the hill thugs, doing everything but FIGHT, despite being six feet apart - just enough room for the 5 or so extras, dressed as riot police to fit in (obviously a tight budget). Only then do we see some pathetic shoving about, resembling a fight in a Thursday morning Post Office pension queue. What is puzzling is that the rogue policeman, despite taking over the protection racket (consisting of one garage) and telling the owner he has to pay 'him' now, then inexplicably shoots him in virtually the next scene, thereby rendering the exercise pointless. It's safe to assume that I hated this movie - low-budget it may be but every single facet of this movie is appalling. With better direction, a better script and a few more quid spent, this might have been redeemable. As it is, it's simply amateurish and embarrassingly bad!

So I am full of hope, the Brits made another awesome hooligan movie.

What the hell, what is this? I have questions, millions of question.

1) Is that chubby lead actor very rich? Did he buy himself a role? It can not be he was casted. Surely? 2) Why, in the opening scene, show a woman with big boobs, and then the whole movie nothing, absolutely nothing? Did they know the movie was so bad that the only way people would sit through this was the promise of massive jugs? 3) Fighting scenes. In 1960 they knew how to make the scenes better.

This movie is an insult to all those great cult movies, is an insult to acting, actors and everything it stands for. Non of these actors should ever be allowed to be on the white-screen again. Isn't there some sort of police for this? I had to create an IMDb account, just to express my disbelieve.

OK, so I noticed this film and got hooked in by the 5 star blah blah and the (at the time) IMDb rating of 7.0. Usually means it will be of a decent standard even if you don't like the premise or the movie itself. Oh how wrong. I couldn't literally believe how bad ALL of the acting was. Some people mention the performance of the lead actor; well they are clearly his friends because he was the best of a very bad bunch. The guy who played the character "Lee" was so miscast it is untrue. You will never hear an Essex "hard man" talk the way that he does. It was hard enough anyway but from the moment he entered the movie any ounce of seriousness I had had evaporated. Such a poor actor. I would go so far as to say it was a total embarrassment to the British film industry and I hope I never watch a movie as bad ever again. I lasted around 30 minutes and then my girlfriend and I watched "The Martian", then you can see what real actors can actually do. Do not waste your time. It won't be long until this film has a 3/4 rating on here, and even that would be extremely generous.