Rise of the Footsoldier (2007)

Taking many cues from the vastly superior Goodfellas (1990), RotF is a British crime flick that documents a regular football yob's move from spilling rival blood on the terraces to unflinching murderous gangland crime, via a route that's less than subtle, to say the least. The aggressive nature of the individual in question, Carlton Leach (Ricci Harnett), is reflected in the film's shooting style, which is like a hammer to the face. The hope appears to be that the thuggish and engineered-to-shock graphic violence will help distract from the fact that Carlton and almost everything else about the film is one-note. But anyone able to see beneath the surface will likely come to the same conclusion as I did, that RotF is a story of excess that loses sight of all but one of its most base goals;. i.e. the peddling of onscreen brutality.

2½ demolition jobs out of 5