London, modern day: Joe, a mild mannered young man is bored by his life. When his beloved brother is murdered Joe finds solace in Piggy, one of his brother's old friends. Read more …
Piggy helps Joe to cope with grief, intent on saving him and helping him get justice for his brother's killing. As their friendship grows Joe finds himself in an increasing dangerous and murky world of violence and revenge.
Judging by the gloomy atmosphere [writer-director Kieron Hawkes] and cinematographer James Friend conjure throughout, Hawkes has bags of technical talent. If only he’d applied it to a script where we cared about the characters.
Fluidly lensed and unsettling for an hour, writer/director Kieron Hawkes’ debut thins out badly in the final third, leaving the charismatic Anderson to prop it up.
Piggy, free to enact the grisly retribution that Joe's incapable of, could be a Durden-esque alter ego (Anderson plays him with a similar swagger) – but between the beating and the stamping on heads, we're not given much time to decide.
Grim and grittily violent, the film is rich in atmosphere by taking in the seediness of London’s back streets but, alas, offers little in the way of surprises in the plot department.
Capable but monotonous, it ends with a predictable twist that has a distinguished literary lineage.
Too dull, too often.
Martin Compston talks about taking dark turn in Piggy
General release. Check local listings for show times.
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