Villain comes to the screen from actor-turned-director Philip Barantini, a filmmaker with two very striking shorts under his belt already, and his first feature is a massive calling card to the industry..
Photo credit: Alex Fountain
If the Villain movie poster were presented to you promising another new British crime movie, you may be forgiven for knowing what to expect. This kind of movie – of which some are very good, others not so much – have found their own niche within the industry, and the genre, along with horror, are also some of the most profitable. Villain is an altogether different movie. With its roots very firmly in the crime bracket, Barantini and co-writers George Russo and Greg Hall have a product cut from a different cloth.
A career-best Craig Fairbrass is Eddie Marks, a criminal who we are introduced to during his final days of a ten-stretch inside one of Britain’s toughest prisons. Upon leaving, his plan is to go straight, moving away from his violent past and the vicious figures he formerly associated with. However, his brother Sean (Russo) has got himself into a bit of trouble with local bad men Roy and Johnny Garrett (Robert Glenister and Tomi May) who he owes some cash to, and all of this causes a big problem for Eddie’s plan to go down the straight and narrow.
That brief synopsis may suggest some genre cliches, and yes, there are a lot of them in the screenplay – there are the expletives and violence that you may expect, as well as some slightly cartoonish characters on the sidelines. However, the screenwriters, director, producers, actors and indeed everyone else involved are gunning for a final product with more substance, and not your traditional DTV supermarket find that’ll go down nicely with a couple of lagers and a kebab late on a Friday night.
As I said, Fairbrass, who I think has been completely under-appreciated in his three decade-plus-long career, has never been better, bringing a certain humanity to Eddie, a character who you actually care for as he navigates a tricky new path post-prison – his scenes with his on-screen daughter are particularly poignant. This is the first of an impressive one-two punch (look out for Muscle later in the year). Russo is also excellent both on-screen and as co-screenwriter, and there is able back-up from the likes of the menacing Glenister, and an excellent turn from Izuka Hoyle as Chloe Franks, Eddie’s estranged daughter.
Having seen Barantini’s shorts, the excellent ‘Seconds Out‘ and the jaw-dropping ‘Boiling Point’ (a feature version of which is currently in pre-production with Stephen Graham in the lead) you appreciate the approach he has taken with his debut film – one that is gritty and grounded; a true hark back to the tone of the hardy thrillers of the seventies and eighties.
I was impressed with Villain. It’s a welcome break from the conveyor-belt direct-to-DVD-style ‘c’-bomb-laden movies in this category and truly one of the most striking directorial feature debuts we’ve seen for quite some time.
Villain is now available on-demand and in select cinemas.
