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Movies / On DVD / Green Street Hooligans
Green Street Hooligans

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Green Street Hooligans (2005)

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Reviews Counted:59

Fresh:27

Rotten:32

Average Rating:5.5/10

Consensus: When it comes to the subculture of soccer thugs, Green Street Hooligans lacks sufficient insight, and instead comes off as a Fight Club knock-off.

Runtime: 1 hr 49 mins

Genre: Dramas

Synopsis: GREEN STREET HOOLIGANS: In 1988, British director Alan Clarke set a high benchmark for movies about soccer hooliganism with a brutal, unflinching drama called THE FIRM. Few dared follow in Clarke's... GREEN STREET HOOLIGANS: In 1988, British director Alan Clarke set a high benchmark for movies about soccer hooliganism with a brutal, unflinching drama called THE FIRM. Few dared follow in Clarke's estimable footsteps. But filmmaker Lexi Alexander, who joined a gang of soccer thugs during her childhood in Germany, seems well placed to be the director of GREEN STREET HOOLIGANS, which returns to the controversial subject matter some 17 years after Clarke's film. Matt Buckner (Elijah Wood) is a student who travels to London after getting kicked out of Harvard. Ostensibly there to visit his sister, Matt instead forms an unlikely bond with her husband's brother, Pete Dunham (Charlie Hunnam), who takes him to a soccer match to see his team, West Ham. At the game, the inevitable happens, and Matt's initial trepidation at the violence swelling around him soon turns into a pulse-racing, visceral thrill. Suddenly finding a taste for the hooligan life, Matt joins Pete's "firm," the Green Street Elite, leading to further booze-fueled confrontations and providing an opportunity for Matt to keep a journal explaining why he's attracted to such a violent pursuit. Surprisingly, Elijah Wood manages to fit perfectly into a role that seems ill-suited to his elfin, wide-eyed looks. British actor Charlie Hunnam, who starred in the U.K. version of QUEER AS FOLK and TV's UNDECLARED, neatly complements Wood as the Cockney boy who leads him into danger, and together the two actors manage to carve out convincingly violent characters. A loud, energetic soundtrack and roaming, trembling camera work create a disquieting atmosphere in a movie punctuated with scenes of rampant brutality. Sensibly not trying to ape Alan Clarke's approach to the subject matter, Alexander has instead created a very effective work built on her own experience. [More]

Starring: Elijah Wood, Charlie Hunnam, Claire Forlani, Marc Warren

Starring: Elijah Wood, Charlie Hunnam, Claire Forlani, Marc Warren, Henry Goodman

Director: Lexi Alexander

Director: Lexi Alexander
Screenwriter: Lexi Alexander
Producer: Deborah Del Prete, Gigi Pritzker, Donald Zuckerman
Screenwriter: Dougie Brimson, Josh Shelov

[See More Credits]

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Reviews for Green Street Hooligans

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1 - 20 (sorted by date; UK critics are listed first)
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N/R

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Full Review Source: Time Out | comment Comment
02/09/06
Time Out
Top Critic Icon Top Critic
N/R

Click to read the article

Full Review Source: Daily Mirror [UK] | comment Comment
09/12/05
David Edwards
David Edwards
Daily Mirror [UK]

Charlie Hunnam turns in an utterly dreadful, line-mangling, squirm-inducing performance (reputedly redubbed, but still atrocious), whilst the voice-over narration is staggeringly appalling.

Full Review Source: ViewLondon | comment Comment
09/12/05
Matthew Turner
Matthew Turner
ViewLondon

A well-intentioned but ultimately calamitous attempt to analyse the so-called 'English disease.'

Full Review Source: BBC | comment Comment
09/06/05
Neil Smith
Neil Smith
BBC
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

A colossal misstep at every turn; the sort of film bound to appeal more to one who knows not a thing about football and the UK than one with even the slightest knowledge.

Full Review Source: FilmFocus | comment Comment
09/04/05
Joe Utichi
Joe Utichi
FilmFocus

Authenticity lends a sharp edge to what would otherwise be yet another gritty drama about British yob culture.

Full Review Source: Shadows on the Wall | comment Comment
08/03/05
Rich Cline
Rich Cline
Shadows on the Wall
N/R

Click to read the article

Full Review Source: CHUD | comment Comment
02/27/09
Nick Nunziata
Nick Nunziata
CHUD

Click to read the article

Full Review Source: Eye for Film | comment Comment
12/07/07
Keith H. Brown
Keith H. Brown
Eye for Film

Click to read the article

Full Review Source: Sacramento News & Review | comment Comment
06/03/06
Jonathan Kiefer
Jonathan Kiefer
Sacramento News & Review

Hunnam e Wood exibem imensa segurança ao carregarem o filme, que também desperta nosso interesse através da análise dos motivos que levam pessoas comuns à violência das torcidas organizadas.

comment Comment
04/02/06
Pablo Villaca
Pablo Villaca
Cinema em Cena

Green Street Hooligans loses any credibility it might have had the minute it tries to pass off Elijah Wood as a tough guy.

Full Review Source: Deseret News, Salt Lake City | comment Comment
12/16/05
Jeff Vice
Jeff Vice
Deseret News, Salt Lake City

Nothing hits harder, or with less tact, than the overriding message, that Matt is really looking for a surrogate family.

Full Review Source: Arizona Daily Star | comment Comment
12/01/05
Phil Villarreal
Phil Villarreal
Arizona Daily Star

At least three writers collaborated on a script that drums out loudly its themes of loyalty, honor and revenge, and the finished product dances quickly enough between cliches to make for passable entertainment.

Full Review Source: Oregonian | comment Comment
11/18/05
Shawn Levy
Shawn Levy
Oregonian
N/R

Click to read the article

Full Review Source: St. Louis Post-Dispatch | comment Comment
10/29/05
St. Louis Post-Dispatch
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

It swims and sinks in melodrama.

Full Review Source: Atlanta Journal-Constitution | comment Comment
10/29/05
Bob Longino
Bob Longino
Atlanta Journal-Constitution

[Alexander] is a better anthropologist than dramatist and her snapshot of this culture is more revealing than the story crafted around it.

Full Review Source: Milwaukee Journal Sentinel | comment Comment
10/27/05
Duane Dudek
Duane Dudek
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

There's a good movie to be made about the violent world of British soccer, or football, as it's called on the other side of the pond. This isn't it.

Full Review Source: Detroit Free Press | comment Comment
10/21/05
John Monaghan
John Monaghan
Detroit Free Press

German kickboxer-turned-director Lexi Alexander's brutal, unsparing portrait of disaffected youth running rampant amid the football stands and terraces of jolly old England.

Full Review Source: rec.arts.movies.reviews | comment Comment
10/20/05
David N. Butterworth
David N. Butterworth
rec.arts.movies.reviews
N/R

Click to read the article

Full Review Source: Houston Chronicle | comment Comment
10/15/05
Houston Chronicle
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

Approaches the sociologically poetic sloganeering of the Smiths at Morrissey's most hooligan-lovestruck.

Full Review Source: Austin Chronicle | comment Comment
10/15/05
Marc Savlov
Marc Savlov
Austin Chronicle
 
 
1 - 20 (sorted by date; UK critics are listed first)
Text View | 1 2 3 4 >> >|
all

Latest News for Green Street Hooligans

August 24, 2009: Lexi Alexander Gets Lifted Opens in new window
Lexi Alexander is at work on her next project, "Lifted," about a boy who "is inspired to compete in a teen singing competition" when his father is re-deployed to Afghanistan.... More...

September 17, 2007: Paddy Considine Is Not Starring in Punisher 2
Paddy Considine is up for the role of the villain in The Punisher: War Zone. Oh, wait -- no, he isn't. More...

July 23, 2007: New Director and Lead for Punisher 2
You may have heard that "The Punisher 2" will be directed by German filmmaker Lexi Alexander, but now we have word on who'll actually be playing the guy. (And no, it's still not... More...

September 16, 2005: "Hooligans" Director Quits "Lyrics" for "Labor"
Director Lexi Alexander, whose "Green Street Hooligans" is presently playing in limited release, has decided to bail on the British rap flick "Life 'n... More...

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