Mob Month: Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels (1998)

Guy Ritchie's films are in my film DNA. Everyone has a film DNA. It's composed of the movies you watched in your formative years. The ones that established what you liked in a film. DNA films are the ones you've seen countless times. Ones you can quote with ease. The ones that survive yearly DVD purges. The ones that gather dust on your shelf. The ones you swear are your favorites, but that you haven't actually watched in ages.

The problem with DNA films is that, often, when you go back and rewatch them, they lose their luster. They turn out to be not as good as you remember. The flaws that you weren't looking for in your youth pop out. Sometimes, over long periods of time, your tastes have changed and the movie that informed your movie DNA in your youth is no longer relevant or held in the same esteem.

Guy Ritchie's latest films have not been great. I am not sure if it's a result of a filmmaker trying to do something he can't, or whether he was never that good in the first place. So I'm a bit worried, now, to rewatch Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels (1998). This is a DNA movie for me. This is a movie that I have a battered, used DVD copy of from a Blockbuster sale. I remember loving this movie.

So... what if it sucks? What if it isn't clever? What if Guy Ritchie never had IT to begin with?

This month I am sampling mob movies from around the globe. Given that Ritchie revolutionized what a British mob/crime film is supposed to look and sound like, I thought it only fair to start with Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels.

I. What is It?

Tom, Soap, Eddy, and Bacon are friends. And they are trying to get rich. After a disastrous card game, they end up half a million in the hole. As the poorly considered plans beget other, more poorly considered plans, every player (and idiot) in the criminal underworld are gathered together in a mad-cap, shoot-em-up finale.

II. On a Shoestring

Guy Ritchie has proven that with a good script, a great core of actors, and panache you can create an entertaining movie on a shoestring and a prayer. Ritchie's flair for interesting images, clever edits and pitch-perfect needle drops more than make up for the fact that there's no money here, or special effects.

His script, too, is sharp and funny, and tightly woven. He leans on how wacky his cockney stars are, and serves them brilliant little lines to growl and wonderfully inane things to pontificate about.

The costuming, also, is on point. One gets the feeling that the production couldn't afford top threads, but that plays, thematically, to the film's themes on tough-guy idiocy. Everything here is dirty, and gross, and oversized. The men often look like boys dressed in their father's suits, trying desperately to be men. The leather jackets are fake, the track suits are baggy, and the gold chains are extra shiny. The badassness is always immediately undercut by the characters' own idiocy.

This movie looks terrible. The DVD transfer I watched was blurry, and the film was color-graded with a yellow filter. It was clearly shot on a cheap camera. But here's the thing: the film succeeds despite it. Ritchie knows how to compose interesting shots, even if the camera he's composing them on isn't the best.

III. Balancing Act

It is completely understandable why people were so high on Ritchie after this film. It's his first. He wrote it. And he directed it. The plot is straight forward, at first, but then Ritchie starts adding in characters and subplots and gags. It's like a five-foot stack of delicate teacups, threatening, at any moment, to topple over and shatter. But Ritchie makes it work. The twists begin flying fast and frequent in the finale, but each one feels earned and paid off. He has laid out all the pieces, and what initially feels chaotic, coalesces into a bonkers tapestry of criminal idiocy and poor choices.

IV. It Accomplishes a Lot In a Little

At 107 minutes, the film is quick and accomplishes quite a bit in a fairly conservative runtime. Ritchie gets in his punches and allows himself some stylistic excess without wasting time.

IX. Should You Watch It?

His later films would stumble, but his earlier work retains its vitality and originality. Guy Ritchie put his mark on the mob film, and influenced a generation of filmmakers after him.

Miscellany

- The film was made on a budget of 960,000 British pounds. It's world gross would reach over $28 million.
- Jason Statham actually worked, for a time, as a street vendor, much like the kind he portrays in the film.
- When Nick the Greek breaks the glass table, it was not scripted. It was an accident. Ritchie liked it so much, he wrote it in and kept it.
- Ritchie dedicated the movie to Lenny McLean, who played Barry the Baptist. He died of cancer shortly before the film debuted.
- Vinnie Jones fist day of filming was the day he was released from jail. He had been arrested for assaulting his neighbor.
- Tom Cruise saw a screening of this film and was instrumental in getting a distribution deal for it. He said it was one of the best movies he'd seen in years.
- The word "fuck" is used 125 times throughout the movie.
- Ray Winstone was originally offered the role of Hatchet Harry.
- The film was nominated for a BAFTA for Film of the Year in 1998, and, in 2000, Ritchie won an Edgar Award for Best Motion Picture Screenplay.