Yardie

A man's quest for retribution brings him into conflict with a vicious London gangster.

This film presents relationships and the struggles and successes of a poor man from Kingston just trying to avenge his brother really strangely. But not only is Yardie the first kind of film like this, but it is Idris Elba's first film as director, and what an entrance he has made, in the box office this film has done really well and has definitely got everyone talking. For me, I've been looking forward to this film for a little while now, and after seeing the musical adverts I was definitely hyped, but was this film a success of more of a let down? Here are my thoughts.

I'll start with what I liked about this film, and there was plenty for sure! But what I enjoyed the most about this film was the level of authenticity that it presented to audiences right from the very start, scenes such as the parties, the shootouts and the rainforests really made the film engaging and believable. A little stereotypical maybe, but the way in which scenes and characters were portrayed definitely had a big impact on the audience. These representations were mainly done through the audio. Music played a massive part in this film and the steady beats in the background really just enhanced the realism and authentic nature that this film presented, they also introduced emotions for the different characters really nicely too, by using a much slower and lower beat for specific gang members, but using a much more up beat and friendly tone for Dennis and Jerry. But the audio had a really strong and powerful effect that really made it important to the film too and helped to portray different emotions which I especially liked; it just really seemed to make tense/emotional/reflective scenes really powerful. The audio really nicely went hand in hand with the narrative throughout the film, usually films have a narrative at the beginning to introduce the characters and plot which I like, but in Yardie, there was a narrative at various parts of the story which really helped to keep the audience up to speed and on track with what was happening and what the characters were doing. However, it wasn't so much that it was distracting as many of the key scenes in the film were easy to understand and decipher. The narrative also did its job of introducing the characters and scenery really nicely, through the use of poetry and slang we were really thrown into the typical Jamaican culture and by doing this, it made the characters really well known and friendly to the audience - as we essentially were given a backstage pass to watch their development through their life. Through scenes from the crossfire of gang warfare like I mentioned, to seeing a child being killed, this introduction to the gang culture and violence in Kingston was not only able to shock the audience but it also was really gripping. Seeing these camera shots quickly done gave the audience a real indication that there were actually there in the crossfire because of the way that the camerawork was done in these scenes. In this sense, Jamaica and Jamaican culture was presented amazingly and this really helped the film later on, especially seeing Dennis going from a troubled young boy to a drug trafficker, to a father. This development of his character was so interesting and engaging to witness, seeing him transform from a violent character out for vengeance, into a family man, is really cool, from a personal level. But seeing him get his vengeance on his enemies is really satisfying to witness, this is another element that the film did amazingly, it really seemed to get the audience involved and engaged nicely to actively make us as an audience have the same feelings as the characters and to replicate these, by giving us a sense of relief at the end when Dennis finds his brothers murder.

The use of character representation went hand in hand with the locations used in the film, a gang ridden Jamaican town, to a murky London suburb. They were both really interesting and the addition of mystery really had a strong and powerful effect at making the characters seem personal and down to Earth. Staying in small London flats and going into pubs and fish and chip shops are all relatable and typical locations for audiences and it just added in a special element into the film. But the transition from a sunny Jamaica, to a wet and lower class London was a really interesting step, because it showed us that Dennis and his friends were in world apart and just helped to translate how lonely he felt, away from where he had known and loved. The Rico character was presented really nicely in London too, his name was constantly mentioned but until roughly half way through the film, we had no idea who he was. This added in a real sense of mystery and surprise into the film, and his character was fairly unoriginal in the sense that he was a typical villainous character, but the sense of mystery that surrounded his background, his company and himself was executed great and just added in a weirdly strange vibe when he was on the screen. A great example of this mystery is during the initial chase scene between Rico and Dennis, where they are shooting each other and chasing down the dark London streets; the shot of Rico shooting a machine gun on a car portrays his angry and villainous character really nicely and helped to personify his anger and negativity. But this film seemed to really show these types of relationships in a really complex manner, for example by showing Dennis's partner and child in an initially defensive manner and then switching this to showing them romantically and constantly switching. It made them seem really unique and helped to encourage her hateful beginnings because of what Dennis was doing but then it personified their love as she kept taking him back - another great example of this, was when the child was caught between them with each parent wanting to go a different way. The parents weren't necessarily the best of friends but their child held them together. The film was full of intense scenes like this, where the main focus of the film didn't seem to be Dennin's drug trafficking, but the relationship he had and his duty to fatherhood which helped to add emotion to the film. These emotions were absolutely amazingly done by using constant camera shots of Dennis's brother, not only did it allow us to understand when he was feeling troubled, but these shots also had an emotional impact as they constantly kept us as an audience remembering his past - it was subtly done but it had a real impact and again, helped us to see another side to the character. The film holds this emotional impact too, for example a lot of characters come and go but even for the smallest characters, when they die you can feel the other characters emotions and it's another really important way in which the film actively gets the audience involved with the characters. The plot seemed fairly strong overall too, and like I said, the use of a narrative really helped us to understand what was going on - essentially spoon feeding us the plot. The film was also full of engaging and emotional twists too, these twists were really gripping and seemed to portray different characters in a variety of different lights, adding more character to the, well characters... The narrative at the end of the film linked to these switches and plot twists well and tied up the film nicely, by repeating quotes from the beginning which added a nice touch. The way in which the characters, plot and scenery in this film were presented to the audience in this film were so great and really made the film engaging and exciting to watch throughout, for sure.

This film wasn't all plain sailing though. The main issue that I had with this film was that, even with narrative, there were still many parts of the film where I was completely lost and baffled as to what was happening and why. Simply because the films plot seemed to jump and skip over really essential scenes that would've helped to make it easily understandable. The characters didn't seem to help this out either, the two brothers had a real genuine and nice relationship, but it didn't seem to really grip or engage with me as I hoped that it would, there wasn't much time with the brothers together and personally for me, there just didn't seem to be enough there for their relationship to seem gripping. Which would've really helped to add much more emotion and feeling to the film. This links well to the general feel of the film, it seemed to be far too cliche for a crime/gangster film; where many of the lines of dialogue, acting and even choices of character personality seemed to replicate far more popular and successful crime films out there, there wasn't a really believable enemy and rivalry between Dennis and everyone else which was a real shame.

Many of the decisions made by the characters throughout the film were made far too quickly and generally without context. For example Dennis's choice not to kill the burglars but instead, to befriend them. Scenes and decisions like this just really seemed to make me confused and question his sanity. But mainly it made me want to question the strength and validity of the plot. The plot itself had many problems, not only did it struggle to actually make sense but there were really long parts during the film where nothing actually happened, not only did this help the audience to forget what the point of his trip to London was, but it also made parts of the film seem really dull and boring. No action, no chases, no shooting and not even any confrontations, and this was for a crime film, oh no... The variety of side stories in the film didn't help with understanding the plot either, they made the original plot quite difficult to keep up with and understand, it's not that there were too many side stories, but they all just seemed complicated and got in the way of the original plot. Or maybe it's all because someone was snoring very loudly in front of me for the whole film... :/

Overall, I would give this film a 7.5. The manner in which the characters adapted and changed throughout the film was really nice and enjoyable to witness, the film also used a variety of interesting audio and camera effects to create some really good and interesting looking scenes which had a really good impact, making parts of the film exciting and nerve racking. But the faults of having parts where nothing seemed to happen, using unoriginal character roles and just generally having a fairly confusing storyline and set of relationships really seemed to let the film down, especially as I have been looking forward to it for so long. However, I have been told that some people loved the film, whereas some hated it, so maybe it's one of those films where you either love it or hate it? I'll let you decide, especially as I would say if you haven't got anything on and you have a spare few quid then you should go watch it. But I definitely wouldn't recommend going there with high expectations.

Thank you for reading my review, I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I did watching the film and writing the review, I hope you have a lovely day! :)