TWENTYFOURSEVEN A film review by Steve Rhodes Copyright 1998 Steve Rhodes
RATING (0 TO ****): * 1/2
Why do filmmakers feel compelled to tell us basically the same story we've already heard? Last year it was VOLCANO and DANTE'S PEAK, and this year we have THE BOXER and TWENTYFOURSEVEN, which might have been more aptly titled THE BOXER-LIGHT - very light.
As the story opens, a completely unrecognizable Bob Hoskins is found almost dead in an abandoned railroad car. With a bloated face, hair like a discarded mop, bruised skin and incoherent demeanor, Hoskins, as the story's protagonist Alan Darcy, immediately shocks us. And with Ashley Rowe's gritty black-and-white cinematography the movie looks quite promising.
Then it proceeds to go nowhere.
We are told Darcy's story in flashback. The picture's sporadic voice-over by Hoskins is intelligent and insightful, something the rest of the script by Paul Fraser and the film's director Shane Meadows isn't.
Darcy tells us that the kids in public housing lead a terrible life twenty-four seven, meaning all week long. "If you've never had anything to believe in, you're always going to be poor," he reasons with us. So he sets up a boxing club for the troubled youth exactly as Daniel Day-Lewis did in THE BOXER.
The film lacks any coherent narrative. Ramblingly along with little happening - there's not even much boxing or practicing - the teens in his club make small talk and go on hikes in the woods, in which the director gives visual emphasis to such trivia as going to the bathroom outdoors.
The large supporting cast has precious little to do. The director makes them into a faceless slice of humanity with no one standing out. This is somewhat complicated by the accents, except for Hoskins's, which are so thick that subtitles might have helped - but not much. The actors evidence little energy or compassion for the movie, and they all play interchangeable parts. We learn that the teens and their parents are an angry lot, although the movie rarely goes to the trouble of explaining their motivation, other than being poor.
When the big boxing match finally happens, it's more like a quick barroom brawl. (Notice that their weight is announced in stones, which makes for a nice metaphor.) Only when one fight goes tragically wrong does the story finally come alive with some much needed, genuine poignancy. Other than that, the lifeless picture is easily forgotten.
TWENTYFOURSEVEN runs 1:36. It is rated R for language, violence and some drug content and would be fine for older teenagers.
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