Review No.142: Wild Bill

Since the days growing up watching Press Gang I've always had a soft spot for Dexter Fletcher who arguably had his biggest success with Guy Ritchie's Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels but now Fletcher is stepping behind the camera to helm a film about a notorious East End thug coming out of prison. Thankfully Wild Bill doesn't owe a lot to Ritchie's film-making, especially some of his gangster films where he almost lapsed into self-parody, but instead is a rather sweet tale of a father trying to reconnect with the sons who have all but forgotten him. Charlie Creed-Miles takes the lead role of Bill Hayward, formerly known as Wild Bill, who returns to his old manor to try and make amends with the family who he left behind when he went to prison eight years ago. He discovers that the boys' mother has disappeared to Spain leaving 15 year old Dean, played by Son of Rambow's now very mature Will Poulter, to care for his younger brother Jimmy played by Attack the Block's Sammy Williams. Dean has dropped out of school and is now an apprentice builder, working on the completion of one of the Olympic buildings, while Jimmy often bunks off school and eventually is tempted into a drug gang by Pill a white man who thinks he is black played by Misfits star Iwan Rheon. When Bill reveals to his probation officer that the two underage boys live alone she immediately informs child services so Dean blackmails his father to stay a little longer until he convinces the social workers that they have a stable living environment. While Bill finds it easier to connect with Sammy, Dean is less keen on him however after he sorts out the business with his younger son and Pill he gains the respect of his older son who himself is having romantic difficulties with single mother Zoe. However Bill's old criminal associates are less than thrilled that he is staying in the area so inevitably events come to a head in an old East End pub with interesting results.

Through the plot description and DVD cover of Wild Bill it seemed that Fletcher was trying to emulate Ritchie by creating an all-star gangster epic however Wild Bill owes more to the heart-filled bleak work of Shane Meadows. Creed-Miles is utterly believable as the former villain who has a reputation in the area but now simply wants to lie low and who initially has aspirations of travelling North to work on the oil rigs but has to stay to fulfil his responsibilities to his children. The actor walks around with a hand-dog expression and creates sympathy for Bill as someone who can no longer get through to his older son despite his best efforts however you can also tell through his eyes that there is a violent past in there somewhere. There are also some great performances from Liz White as tart-with-a-heart Roxy and Iwan Rheon who is brilliant as the comic henchman even if his accent can get a tad annoying at times. The most impressive members of the cast though are the two sons namely Poulter who has grown into a very mature actor and here plays someone who is trying to act old beyond his years but at the same time is still an awkward 16 year old boy. Williams too is good as a younger lad who is lost without any parental guidance but who is glad to have his father back in his life. I enjoyed too the fact that Fletcher has made a point of transposing both the old school East End of London with its dank pubs and greasy spoons alongside the new London of the Olympics which is seen in great detail due to Dean's work on the stadium. Fletcher and co-writer Danny King have also created a script which combines genuine characters with plenty of witty one-liners as well as some menacing violence in the film's final act. Where I felt it fell down to an extent was with the Guy Ritchie-esque gangster characters all of whom seem fairly generic and whose drug dealing empire doesn't really seem that impressive even Andy Serkis' cameo as a gangland boss can't save this element of the plot. Overall though Fletcher's film has a lot of heart and plenty of wit so via this film I can see him having as much success as a writer/director as he previously had as an actor.

Verdict: Though it falls down a bit in the clichéd gangster scenes overall Fletcher's Wild Bill is a funny and warm film about what it means to be a family unit so for those reasons I will give it 7/10