Hard Boiled Sweets

"Hard Boiled Sweets" is yet another one of those indie crime thrillers that go for a Tarantino vibe and fail miserably. It bathes in a faux- cool atmosphere, I never thought you could squeeze so many embarrassing attempts at clever one-liners into just one movie. Every line needs to be a Mark Twain quote, because what else would you do with your dialogues? Explore your characters, shed some light on their motivations? That seems difficult, let's skip that part. It's kind of a shame really, because this movie does have a very crafty plot. There are several twists you genuinely do not see coming, and usually that's good enough for me to like a movie. But the clever plot is just drowned out with one groan-inducing line after the other, so this is a tough movie to rate. I don't think I've ever been this irritated by a movie I enjoyed so much. Make of that what you will.

Hard Boiled Sweets rises above many other British gangland thrillers by sheer weight of the unexpected. It's filmed really well, and is well cast. Nor does it outstay it's welcome at around 80 minutes or so. It moves pretty quick, so much so, that when the surprises start to kick in, it's a very easy ride to the finish. Hard Boiled Sweets deserves to be on any recent list of competent British crime-land dramas.

Was this a tax write off?

Who green lighted and financed such a horrible film?

PLEASE let me script and write a UK gangster flick,I promise it will be 10,000 times better than this awful pile of steaming dog poop.

Whose idea was it to use those stupid signed candy nic-names for the characters every 10 minutes? The director's girlfriend? DUMB!

What a mess….poor script,weak acting,cliché after cliché,pathetic HACKNEYED gangster trope after cliché after played out trope.

The only bright spot of this abysmal mess is the cinematography. Other than that you might be more enthralled and entertained if YOU stuck you head in the toilet,as this is indeed a class "A" toilet clogging straight to DVD/dumper of a film.Honestly I couldn't finish it because I could care less about anyone or anything in this film,and that is being kind. AVOID!

What Can I say.....? Great dialogue. Great Gals. Great pacing. Just.... Great all round.

Nice mix of low rent "Sin City" set down south at the Kiss Me Quick seaside town of South End.

Lot's going on to keep you amused and dialogue that is up there with Crime Noir writers like Leonard and Ellroy - it would give Tarantino a run for his money. Let me tell you that, My Son....

Check it out if you liked Lock Stock. Same pacing and humour.

Not sure why it is below most people's radar on IMDb.

But I loved it.

The movie is based on a short story and that is (my guess) why and how the filmmaker got the money to do the movie. The short movie is on the DVD (I'd think every nation must have it, but check before you buy/rent it of course) and you can watch it afterwards to see the differences. It's not that long and if you liked at least the idea you can judge for yourself what you think of it.

Of course the short movie is expanded a lot and ends on a different note too. The acting is decent enough for a movie like this and it might surprise you from times to times. Still there are quite a few things that are wrong. You might care about them or not (it tries too hard to be cool, story flaws and filmmaking flaws), but let's see where this filmmaker is going.