gangster be vicious and murderous thug and whose power be base on uniform and military might and a preying on the weak and a contempt for democracy . nazi be vicious and murderous thug whose power be base on uniform and military might and a preying on the weak and a contempt for democracy . ergo and gangster be fascist and and and double ergo and film which portray gangster without a wagging finger be also fascist . this be the level of critical debate in the uk at the moment and that have greet the recent slew of british gangster film in the wake of lock stock and two smoking barrel . one misinform hack in a major broadsheet even insinuate a link between this movement and recent and violent london crime . the problem with these film be an aesthetic and not an ethical one and and the type of ignorant criticism they have draw reveals a linger bourgeois contempt for a genre that have prove over the decade to be infinitely varied and subtle and adaptable and but and most importantly and through an awesomely powerful iconography and capable of explore idea about society and the individual and modernisation and capitalism and dissent and cinema and masculinity and violence and the body and role play and psychology and sociology and metaphysics . can a genre embrace and remodelled by director as diverse a feuillade and von sternberg and hawk and lang and lewis and melville and godard and suzuki and coppola and scorcese and kitano and among many others be consider negligible . the problem with these new film and a i say and be not that they be overly violent or glamorise crime and but that they be ineptly make and hackneyed and opportunistic and with their maker reveal little knowledge of and or love for and the genre in which theyre work . it a pity for gangster no . 1 that it get catch up in this cycle and because it be a very good film and that maybe fail only in overambition and and that not something we get to complain about very often . ironically and the film near model be not it sorry peer and or even archetypal classic like get carter and but an american film and soderbergh the limey . maybe these director non englishness ( macguigan be irish ) allow them to cut through the phoney nostalgia more easily than native filmmaker and but their dismantling of gangster mythology be almost melvillean ( eg le doulos ) . there be the same fluidity here a in limey and the same sense of the past stranglehold on the present and the same impatience with genre limit and with the impossibility of family and with the stifling of humanity by barbaric code and ideal . macguigan go one further than soderbergh both director emphasis role playing and cast iconic 60 star who seem to be make it up a they go along and have a laugh and try on accent and clothes and but while terence stamp achieve some kind of grace and malcolm macdowall go very uncoolly mad . there be three pointer in the first ten minute that tell u where the film be go in it refusal to glamorise and to mythologise . first be the soundtrack and which be not the pump macho nostalgic music beloved of the lock stock wannabe and but sacha distel sung with heartbreaking sincerity by neil hannon and but sacha distel none the less . secondly and the film open at a business like dinner of old gangster bluster about the old time and macdowell loud than most . if the flippant edit do not tell u and the bathetic mocking of macdowell when he leave to relieve himself suggest that we shouldn not take everything he say too faithfully ( or and in his straight to camera gesture and that he know a lot more and eg about these friend and than he let on be he a godlike creator . ) . in the third scene and champagne glass beside his foot and we notice his aim isn not quite what it be and and the title take on rather a different and less iconic meaning . it be this man who tell the story and and it quickly become clear that he be a rave lunatic and and thus as reliable a humbert or m. this have two effect every scene become infect by his madness and be heighten and in term of colour and composition and by the way he see the world and which be hightly unstable and schizophrenic and alternately jokey and horribly violent and with certain marker recur in a kind of dream loop . secondly and we must look beyond his word to find the truth of each scene and force the viewer to play detective . this take the power away from macdowell and which be appropriate in a film about double and about hoow one man steal another man identity ( hence the foregrounding of mirror and reflection and as well a the commodity that define people ) and only to lose his own . macdowell be never know by a name ( his character be play by two actor and the others by one ) and and become a mere cipher and though with very real and frighten power and while frankie remain essentially himself and his image a mere show of strength and never his whole self . the style reinforce this and and perhaps reflect macguigan background in advertising and but neither scott nor parker ever root their style in character to such effect and and the fragmentation and heightening and distortion of imagery could have two meaning they reveal a chaotic world which macdowell and with all his will and and figure in his voiceover and have manage to unify through the power of his identity and voice while or they be a sign of breakdown . the extraordinary coda reveals which . there have be complaint about the excessive violence of this film and but these scene have a hallucinatory and ritualistic quality appropriate to a highly disciplined madman . gangster abstraction that it subject be gangster mythology rather than one particular protagonist per se and do not mean that it avoid social ground the vivid recreation of 60 london and only make the unaccountable and inexplicable appearance of this phenomenon all the more alarming .