film review

Review

(film planning not posting)

Ill Manor is an Urban-crime drama set in East London, there are two central protagonists, Ed Skrein 

and Riz Ahemd. Specifically in East London it was set in Forest Green which made a suitable location to film because of the dilapidated buildings and streets alike.  The film was written and directed by musician Plan B who had previously written a film called ‘Michelle’ which was about the prostitute who acted in the feature length version ‘Ill Manors’. This film also has a tracklist created by plan B.

Ill Manors starts with a drug deal and just drugs in general being shown throughout the film. Ed and Riz are on a corner selling drugs when the police intervene and Ed is kept over night in a cell, Although the Police were prevalent at the beginning throughout the rest of the movie they cease to exist until the end when the Russians are raided by armed police. For many people in Britain who live normal lives they wouldn’t have seen drugs being sold or used and for a small (ish) area, drug use is a little exaggerated. This is also the case for the amount of violence and gun crime, seeming as firearms are illegal to own in the UK a lot of people seem to have them as though they are toys. The film is said to reflect social-realism, granted in many scenes it does however the violence is over-exaggerated for a London area.

The film has an accompanying soundtrack with 28 songs all created by director Plan B. The songs that feature in the movie were explicitly created for it and the lyrics talk about the events going on in the scene in a little more detail than what the scene will initially give. The film was inspired by the London riots in 2011 which were very vivid and this gave the writer lots to put in the script as well as the songs. The album is a ‘cross promotion’ with the film because plan B’s musical audience are being pointed towards his film and the people watching his film are being directed towards his music.

The film is fairly low budget but managed to rake in a profit of over £400,000 in the 8 weeks that it was in the British box-office. Plan B managed to save money by hiring some pretty un-heard of cast members, there was only a couple of actors that have a higher profile- Riz Ahmed who has featured in many other films such as nightcrawler ect… and Ed Skreins who his plan B’s childhood friend and acted in a short film made by plan B prior to Ill Manors. Theses two actors were also the main protagonists and throughout the film the audiences opinion changes of them as in the beginning Ed can be seen as a villain and a thug but towards the end the audiemce will be more sympathetic towards his as he gives his own life to save a babies life. Moreover, throughout the film Aron played by Riz is seen as a compassionate ‘drug dealer’ as where others may not think twice about doing something wrong Riz would do the opposite as he felt sorry for the girl being prostituted and took care for the baby when the mother left it on the train, and despite selling it (which was as a result of Ed)  he went back to retrieve it which shows to the audience that he has a sense of right and wrong.

The target audience for this film, in my opinion would be from 15-25 despite it being rated an 18 by the bbfc. It was also made for an Art house audience but not a typical middle class/ middle aged white audience but a newer type of audience who could relate to the situations in the film. It may be equally suitable for male and female, however it may be a more predominantly male audience due to the violence and rap music which is usually associated with boys. This film is also more suited for a British audience as it is a fully British film and funded by British money (Micro Wave films London).Audiences may also see London of a place to avoid, this is because there were various shots of characters around the new olympic park in 2012 (the time that it was filmed) so people may have been put off to see how much violence there actually was around a highly protected sporting event.