Michael Caine cleans up in Harry Brown

Gun law: Harry Brown (Michael Caine) aims to avenge his best friend
10 April 2012

Daniel Barber, a short-film Oscar nominee, has already been told that his debut feature is a portrait of the broken society David Cameron is always talking about.

It is made in a south London of dangerously drug-infested estates where feral youths roam threateningly and old men in seedy pubs bemoan the state of things.

Two of these old boys are Harry (Michael Caine), an ex-Marine pensioner, now fallen on hard times, and his gnarled best friend Leonard (David Bradley).

When Leonard gets done over by the ferals, Harry decides to buy a gun and deal with the culprits himself. He is well over 70 but as obstinate as a mule.

As much an urban western as a social document, Barber’s vision frequently tips over into melodrama.

At one point Harry visits the lair of a drugged-out criminal to buy the gun; he finds porno on the telly, an unconscious young girl stretched out before him and half an acre of cannabis plants.

After dealing with that lot, he progresses past a kindly detective inspector (Emily Mortimer) and an incompetent senior policeman (Iain Glen) to mete out revenge on the killers of Leonard.

This is all directed with some flair, beautifully shot by Martin Ruhe — who was the cinematographer of Control — and well acted throughout. Caine’s central performance is as impressive as anything he has recently done.

But you can’t believe everything is this bad for a moment and Barber’s film is merely a better version of Death Wish. If society is as broken as this, it will take more than mere politicians to mend it.

Harry Brown
Cert: 18

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in