Rise Of The Footsoldier: Origins (18)

Tony Tucker and buddies Frampy, Jacko and Pete served together in the Falklands War. They remain a band of brothers years later and intervene to save a young man from a brutal mugging outside a nightclub. The victim's grandfather, Ian Jarvis, offers Tony a job as a doorman at his club, Hollywoods in Romford. Tony roots out disloyalty among the bouncers, installs his friends as the new security detail. They defect to rival club Raquels in Basildon, where events spiral out of control.

LondonNet Film Review
Rise Of The Footsoldier: Origins (18)

In the opening 60 seconds of director Nick Nevern’s tale of violence and retribution, bile-spewing Essex hard men toss out three c-bombs and twice as many f-grenades before a punch to the face momentarily silences the verbal onslaught. Profanities are as common as commas and full stops in Rise Of The Footsoldier: Origins. Based on true events, the fifth film in the blood-spattered series is another prequel to the 2007 dramatisation of the Rettendon murders, which joined a long list of homegrown gangster thrillers that jumped on and fell off the Lock, Stock,… bandwagon…

Nevern’s knuckle-bruised picture welcomes back Terry Stone, Roland Manookian and Craig Fairbrass as the victims of the 1995 shooting – Tony Tucker, Craig Rolfe and Pat Tate – while Billy Murray briefly reprises his role as Mickey Steele, one of the men jailed for the execution down a quiet farm lane. Violence is treated as everyday self-expression. One hapless geezer, who flirts with the wrong woman, is rewarded with multiple blows to the face from a snooker ball while another fella’s prize motor is thoroughly doused with petrol to make a point. “It’s gone beyond word, mate,” growls the perpetrator before he lights a match and walks away from an automotive fireball.

Tony Tucker (Stone) and buddies Frampy (Michael Elkin), Jacko (Sam Gittins) and Pete (Jacey Elthalion) served together in the Falklands War. They remain a band of brothers years later and intervene to save a young man (Kieran Moggan) from a brutal mugging outside a nightclub. The victim’s grandfather, Ian Jarvis (PH Moriarty), offers Tony a job as a doorman at his club, Hollywoods in Romford. Tony roots out disloyalty among the bouncers, installs his friends as the new security detail and introduces a fresh music policy – acid house – spearheaded by DJ Brandon Block (Chas Symonds). Hollywoods goes from strength to strength.

Over in Basildon, Dave Simms (Keith Allen), debt-riddled owner of nightclub Raquels, hires hard man Bernard O’Mahoney (Vinnie Jones) to root out football hooligans in his clientele led by Joey Waller aka Basildon Joe (George Russo). Bernard convinces Tony and his boys to switch allegiances for a 20% cut of profits from the door, cloakroom and bar. Drug dealer Pat Tate (Fairbrass) is dragged into the escalating feud between Raquels’ doormen and Basildon Joe.

Co-written by Nevern and Andrew Loveday, Rise Of The Footsoldier: Origins squanders the addition of Jones, who has little to occupy his time besides a gratuitous torture scene with a hammer and fish hooks. Pacing is inconsistent and the running time feels longer than 106 minutes. Dodgy haircuts and a 1980s-scented soundtrack of Black Box, Laura Branigan, New Order, Sam Fox, Taylor Dane, The Thompson Twins and Ultravox turn back the clock more convincingly than the lead cast.

– Kim Hu