Review: Green Street Hooligans: Underground

Scott Adkins stars as the former leader of West Ham’s Green Street Elite, a soccer hooligan ‘firm’. He comes back to the old neighbourhood after several years when hearing that his thuggish younger brother has been killed in an underground hooligan stoush. Yep, hooliganism has now gone underground. Adkins reluctantly joins forces with cop Joey Ansah (who is also the film’s fight choreographer) to figure out who was behind the young man’s brutal death. Meanwhile, he also tries to whip the old crew into fighting shape, seemingly all having become a bunch of lazy bums in Adkins’ absence. Kacey Barnfield plays the saucy local barmaid Adkins becomes sweet on and vice versa. Spencer Wilding plays a hulking rival gang leader.

 

The original “Green Street Hooligans” didn’t do much for me as I’m not a fan of soccer or the associated hooliganism. It was relatively well-made for what it was, but what it was didn’t interest me much, and co-stars Charlie Hunnam and Elijah Wood weren’t especially convincingly cast. I didn’t even bother with the second film at all. However, with Scott Adkins in the lead, I had to check out this third film in the franchise from 2013.

 

I probably should’ve given it a miss too, to be honest. Directed by James Nunn (Adkins’ much better “Eliminators” and “One-Shot”) and scripted by Ronnie Thompson (who has directed episodes of “EastEnders”) it’s basically “Best of the Best” for soccer hooligans and frankly not much good. At its heart it’s your standard ‘guy enters fighting tournament to avenge the death of a loved one’ film and it’s not one of the better films of its ilk. Still, the film and its worldview is perfectly suited to arse kicker Scott Adkins, and it kinda makes sense for this thuggery to move ‘underground’ as well. Although the brawling style of fighting on screen is less appealing to me than Adkins’ usual martial arts/MMA style, the absurdity of the on-screen thuggery is somewhat amusing. At first. I also thought actress Kacey Barnfield (these days billed as Kacey Clarke) to have something intangible on screen in addition to obviously being hot. She and Adkins share quite a bit of chemistry, too.

 

Unfortunately, I quickly grew tired of the film. In theory, Adkins being in a film about underground fighting and general thuggery sounds can’t miss, and usually that would be the case. However, in the execution it becomes not terribly interesting after a while, though your mileage may differ. For me the plot was clichéd (and might alienate fans of the more slightly more serious first film), the fights all started to blend together, and although Adkins and Barnfield are good, the rest of the performances simply aren’t up to snuff. Lead villain Spencer Wilding looks incredibly imposing (he’s a Welsh-born boxer and kickboxer) but can’t act to save himself and as soon as you hear him talking like a bad Boris Karloff impersonator, the intimidation factor evaporates. The late twist with his character is utterly absurd as well. It’s not surprising that Wilding has mostly worked in non-speaking parts and body doubling (He suited up as Darth Vader in “Rogue One”, played a White Walker on “Game of Thrones” etc), because it all falls apart whenever he opens his mouth.

 

Middle-of-the-pack Scott Adkins vehicle, and probably closer to the back than the front. He’s good and so is Barnfield but that’s about it. If you like street brawling you might want to boost the score up a half notch, but fans of the grittier original might not be terribly interested in this more formulaic fight movie.

 

Rating: C