You only get one shot at life.
Ricky (Ashley Walters) is just out of a young offenders institute, heading home to Hackney and determined to go straight. Instead, he heads straight for trouble when he becomes involved in a street confrontation, siding with his best friend Wisdom (Leon Black) against a local rude boy. The trouble escalates into a series of tit for tat incidents that threaten to spiral out of control.
Ricky's 12-year-old brother Curtis (Luke Fraser), hero-worships Ricky, though he appears smart enough to know he doesn't want to follow his example. Yet, despite the stern warnings from his mother (Claire Perkins) and support from her friends in the community, might Ricky's bad boy allure be too attractive for Curtis to resist?
Evocatively filmed in East London, and with terrific performances throughout, Saul Dibb's début feature is a striking portrait of two black boys growing up in inner city London, a terrifically realised, provocative and pertinent social drama, and a timely damning of gun crime and its devastating effects.
Special Agent Matti
*
MA 15+ (Strong sex scene, violence, coarse language)
89 minutes (1:29 hours)
DVD rental: 26 April 2006
VHS rental: 26 April 2006
