A funny thing happened on the way to the blind spot…

In compiling which dozen films I wanted to cover for this series, I had dozens to choose from. As much as I might seem like the guy who’s seen a ton of films, a quick glimpse at the recent Sight & Sound poll tells me that I still have miles to go before I sleep. However, in settling on just twelve, I wanted to vary up the genres, eras, and “essentiality”. Thus, I decided to include a film that was only 14-years-old on the roster…and it was that decision that might have proved to be a slight mis-step. More on that later.

LOCK, STOCK, AND TWO SMOKING BARRELS is the debut feature by Brit director Guy Ritchie. It involves a lot of characters, but at its core are four friends: Bacon, Soap, Tom, and Eddy (Jason Statham, Dexter Fletcher, Jason Flemyng and Nick Moran). Knowing that Eddy is a card sharp, the friends pool together £100,000 in the hopes that Eddy can parlay it into even larger winnings against a local gangster named Harry The Hatchet. Unfortunately for the lads, this doesn’t work out so well, resulting in them not only losing everything, but being and additional £500,000 in debt by the time the dust settles. Attempts to settle accounts involve some stolen drugs, a pair of antique shotguns, and more English hoods than you can shake a stick at.

I should start by saying that I enjoyed LOCK STOCK a great deal. How I’d gone this long without seeing it is a bit of a mystery – especially since my pal Sean The Cheshire Cat is such a huge fan. The film has aged wonderfully given that it’s just under fifteen years old, and one might think “that figures”…but believe me, there are a lot of films from the end of the 20th century that now seem quaint in their stylistic choices.

The comic timing of LOCK STOCK is just as sharp as it was when it first took England by storm, and likewise when it landed on North American shores. The merry-go-round of a caper still sparks a smile, and the witty jokes still land (“It’s turning into a bad day in Bosnia”). Also surprisingly, the film still looks rather handsome. I say “surprisingly”, because this era of indie filmmaking is starting to look grimier and grimier in the age of hi-definition, and because this was a reasonably low-budget indie. As a piece of filmmaking, there wasn’t a single misstep evident, so no – the film chosen wasn’t what I was alluding to earlier.

No, the misstep I referred to was my decision to include it, when clearly not enough time has passed to cast perspective or add much context. What context I did take away is that it is a film that has had a heavy influence on the caper films that followed in the fourteen years since – including many from England specifically. The slow-fast-slow photography is still often employed, so is the too-cool soundtrack. The film’s patois, its look, its swagger, its pace…all of it can be seen in subsequent titles like IN BRUGES, OCEAN’S ELEVEN, and LAYER CAKE. The latter is an amusing example, since its director Matthew Vaughan was LOCK STOCK’s producer.

In some ways, the film handcuffed director Guy Ritchie for the better part of ten years since he seemingly got stuck in a roundabout of remaking it (SNATCH)…trying to prove he could do more (SWEPT AWAY)…curiously remixing it (REVOLVER)…and ultimately re-embracing it (ROCKNROLLA). Ritchie has shown that as a writer and director, he can always get good thongs out of a band of outsiders, and a piece of loot that continually changes hands. One has to wonder if he might have landed a job like SHERLOCK HOLMES faster if he’d stuck to what he was good at. I don’t say that lightly either – what Ritchie is good at, he is really good at. I dare say only TRAINSPOTTING was as influential a British film in the modern era.

Thus the dilemma, trying to soak up and analyze a “modern classic” that feels like I’ve seen it before.

So in trying to get some context on a “modern classic” as Simon Columb would call it, I turned back to Cheshire and asked him what he liked about it. He said:

I think it’s the culmination of all the elements – it’s got all the levels of criminality converging in one film. The dialogue is amazing, it’s filmed not unlike a 70s blaxploitation flick, the pacing is great, the soundtrack is stellar, and the acting spot on (probably because one or two of the actors just might have experience to draw from…). In the end it’s just a film about 4 best friends finding themselves in the most impossible of situations, and coming out squeaky clean at the end.

So, in summation, LOCK STOCK AND TWO SMOKING BARRELS is a cool and fun movie – and this isn’t a bad thing. The only reason it throws me for a loop is that the series so far has brought me twisted movies, optimistic movies, epic movies, and funny movies. Nothing on the list so far has felt like it could have been made last week, until LOCK STOCK. It reminds me of an oldies station my parents used to listen to in the early 90’s that played “The 50’s, 60’s and 70’s”. I used to always wonder why if we were in the 90’s, this station wasn’t playing 80’s music yet. No I can see why – it was just too soon.

I might have been a bit off base in choosing this film for a retrospective watching-series, but I certainly wasn’t wrong in finally scratching this film off the list of shame. It feels as fresh as the day it was made, and stands head-and-shoulders over all pretenders.

I intend to post my entries on the final Tuesday of every month. If you are participating, drop me an email (ryanatthematineedotca) when your post is up and I’ll make sure to link to your entry.

Here’s the round-up for August…

Sean Kelly watched FULL METAL JACKET

Dan Heaton watched WEST SIDE STORY

David from Blueprint has added a capsule for PERSONA

Courtney Small watched RAN

Steve Honeywell watched WHATEVER HAPPENED TO BABY JANE?

Bob “Look at Me, I’m Done On Time” Turnbull watched THE SEARCHERS and STAGECOACH

Max watched VIVRE SA VIE

16 Replies to “Blindsided by LOCK, STOCK, AND TWO SMOKING BARRELS”

  1. Thanks for the link. I’m enjoying reading everybody else’s catch-ups as well as watching them myself, it’s a great idea. I think I’ll definitely do it again next year as there are a tonne of classics still to watch.

    I haven’t seen Lock Stock for ages. I used to love it when it first came out and I was a teenager. It gave British cinema a much needed kick up the arse too, although it mainly just spawned poor imitations.

    2. I hear you on the plight of server problems – good to know you got back up and running without too much delay.

      In watching LOCK STOCK, I had the same thought running through my head “I’ve seen this before – but not done as well”

  2. Wow Ryan, Wow. Every so often I feel odd about the list of what you haven’t watched. I feel almost that the age old line that Damion plays for me when I admit my blindspots applies to you as well, “How did the internet all you to have a podcast? Aren’t there people who check these things?”

    This is a film that I’ve had a massive history with. Ever since the summer of 2001/2 (I honestly can’t remember which year it actually was) my brother came back from college with this on DVD and I think I watched it everyday for at least a month. It got to the point where I can recite the movie (and though it’s been a while I may be able to get at least 80% today).

    So mr. bubble and squeak, thanks for the review.

    1. Yes, yes, I know – believe it or not there *are* films I haven’t seen, and many of them may shock you. Don’t you remember October when I did the horror film catch-up?

      It’s all about keeping me humble.

      Glad I could remind you of simpler times, maybe after a few more watches I’ll be able to recite it myself.

  3. Ha ha! “Modern Classic”. I think this film qualifies as such. In one respect it shouldn’t (a Brit making a Tarantino film) but, in another respect it should, as it did revitalise the Brit Gangster film genre – other than the ones you mentioned, you wouldn’t get SEXY BEAST or THE BUSINESS without this too.

    Then again, I read a book about the gangster genre and the author claimed that LOCK,STOCK and SNATCH ruined Brit-Gangster films as it is an example of a posh-boy (Ritchie was educated in independent schools having been brought up in Hertfordshire… hardly the urban, gangshter roots Scorsese and Coppola had) writing a script about his view on crime. Indeed, they all speak perfectly and give no impression of a social-struggle – they are just ‘cool’.

    I don’t know if I agree or not, but it is interesting to think about.

    1. True, they’re not the dark, gritty gangster dramas one might prefer, but I’d hardly say Scorsese and Coppola had ‘gangshter roots’ either. Two film school alumni that spent their teenage years watching old movies? Hardly running around the mean streets gunning down pimps and ho’s! 🙂

    2. Scorsese grew up in Little Italy, New York! He himself said about how MEAN STREETS is based on his own experiences to some extent as a Catholic in NYC.

      Coppola has Italian roots! All the rituals and ‘gangster’ practices he knew himself as an Italian Catholic and these were used in THE GODFATHER.

      These are just off the top of my head. A little research would probably find more parrallels.

      Donnie Brasco, the Untouchables and The Departed all have roots based in reality. A bunch of WB gangster films from the 40’s were written by Ben Hecht, an ex Chicago journalist who used the stories from Chicago and adapted them into film scripts (this inc. SCARFACE and ANEGLS WITH DIRTY FACES)

    3. Being Italian and growing up in New York hardly makes them gangsters though. Looking up Scorsese quickly online, he was a bit of a shut in as a child due to his asthma. I don’t think either of them were out fraternising with the types of characters they put on screen.

      I think when Scorsese talks about basing Mean Streets on his life it’ll be the Catholic guilt elements more than the gangster side of things.

      But yes, I guess they have slightly more experience than rich boy Ritchie.

      As for bringing up films like Donnie Brasco etc. I don’t think they share the same intentions of Lock Stock, which is clearly just a bit of fun and not intended to be ‘realistic’.

    4. I’m just going to sit over here until y’all are done. I do love me a debate amongst Brits though – seems so much more dignified than the usual dust-ups we get around here.

  5. I guess I don’t understand the necessity of distance for this film, or really for any film. I understand the need to watch a much older film within the context of when it was created, but I don’t get it here.

    In fact, the idea that Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels feels as current as last week certainly speaks well of it. When I watched this for the first time, I wasn’t looking for some sort of feeling of nostalgia or a throwback to the ’90s. Typically, I see a film being an “Oh, this could only have been made in the ____s” as a weakness in most cases.

    1. Apologies – I struggled with the writing of this one, so I might not have made myself clear.

      LOCK STOCK clearly influenced an entire decade’s worth of films in its look and tone. When it was released, it likely went over like a cannon blast…but in the years that have followed, it feels like “one more film”.

      I’ve seen this sort of malaise in other pieces written about far more influential films – films that involved groundbreaking techniques and effects shrugged off as “Yeah, so?”.

      I don’t go so far as to say “Yeah, so?”, but I think for this series the film was a poor choice. The films so far have largely brought about reflecting on different eras and different voices. This film feeling like a current voice and a still-happening era feels out-of-place.

    2. Ah, that makes more sense. It’s entirely possible, by the way, that the misunderstanding is on my end, too since I’m the only one who didn’t get your meaning.

      I do know what you mean. There are plenty of films that were innovative upon release, but if not watched first end up feeling like just another part of the trend. And I see what you mean in terms of the films on your list.

      However, one of my films on a last Tuesday was even more recent than yours, so I guess I didn’t see an issue. But I get it.

      1. I hear you.

        I don’t know if I’d qualify LOCK STOCK as a must see but I certainly did have fun with it, and can see why so many were raving about it all these years. It’s funny how that can happen isn’t it? Some films become hailed classics over decades, others become touchstones of some sort almost immediately.

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