Throwback Thursday- The Football Factory

Logline: The Football Factory is more than just a study of the English obsession with football violence, it's about men looking for armies to join, wars to fight and places to belong.

Cast: Danny Dyer, Frank Harper, Roland Manookian, Tamer Hassan

Directed by: Nick Love

Sorry for the late reviews - busy weekend with school enrolment and I really haven't had time to post my blogs. The Football Factory was suggested to me by a friend and it's basically about football hooligans. Not American "football", actual football.

Summary

The Football Factory begins with Tom Johnson (Danny Dyer), a football hooligan, being beaten half to death by people whose identities are not quite known yet. The movie explores the culture behind the world's biggest sport and the crazy things fans do in Europe. In specific it follows a group of Chelsea supporters that travel around picking fights with other club's fans and crews of hooligans. The whole movie is revolving around the question that Tom asks when he believes he's about to die in a scrum: was it all really worth it?

Review

This movie is soooooooooo slow.

I can't begin to tell you how slow it progresses. It's slower than The Bourne Legacy. The actual story itself wasn't really a story to begin with. The movie follows hooligans around that joke and play games with one another. The odd time they run into fans of other teams and start fights, but, what's the narrative? About 30 minutes into the movie Tom wakes up with a knife in his face. His friend bashes the guy over the head and that guy turned out to be the brother of a lead football firm based in Millwall. Then they gradually start looking for him because he left his wallet behind. I think there's one intense scene where they're right on him, but nothing else. You don't even feel the sense that Tom is scared.Maybe this movie wasn't meant to be taken seriously, but I can't for the life of me, begin to explain how slow the "story" progresses. 

The one thing I will give credit for in this movie is the fact that it does capture the culture very well. I've never been to England, I've never seen hooligans in action, and I've never experienced the culture, but I have a feeling that this movie was pretty darn good at nailing the typical stereotypes of it. I'm not saying all fans are like this, but there are stories out there and they're similar.

It also took a scene right out of Goodfellas, pretty much just like-but-without the whole "do you think I'm a clown" line . It was pretty much an exact rip off with changed dialogue.

Topic of the Day

Irrelevant characters.

There is an old man in this movie that is shown throughout the duration. His name is Bill (not to be confused with Billy) and he really isn't involved with the plot at all except for the fact that he knows Tommy. At the end he asks Tom if England is the right place for him. That's it... And he's shown so many times in scenes by himself with no other characters present. You kind of get a glimpse at his whole life through the month or so that this movie takes place, but why? I still have no idea. Devoting time to irrelevant characters can killllll a movie's pace. More time dealing with plot and urgency would have been more beneficial than showing this character's life. I could have went without it.

Consensus

The Football Factory attempts to capture the cultural experience of football hooligans in England, but in doing so forgets the basic components that make a story worth watching. I'd go as far as to say this is one of the weakest stories I've ever watched. A lot of it deals with a bunch of guys joking around with each other, but what does that really accomplish? The answer is: not a whole lot. Not worth the watch, not worth the mediocre, but credit is given for capturing the main stereotypes of the culture.

4/10