Institute History
Description
The British gangster genre has enjoyed a renaissance in recent years with films like Sexy Beast; Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels; and Layer Cake (all of which screened at Sundance). However, as cool and stylized as these films and their characters are,…there ain't nothing like the real thing. A Very British Gangster is a potently charged documentary about one of Britain's most dangerous crime families and introduces us to its magnetic, larger-than-life leader.
The film follows the trials and tribulations of Dominic Noonan (aka Lattlay Fottfoy) as he lurches from criminal trial to trial while serving as the patriarch of an entire community, which he protects with his own brand of justice and security. He is both a gangland enforcer and a neighborhood fixer. The world that the film reveals is a disturbing one, full of lost innocence and lives, but the people who inhabit it are welded together through loyalty and love.
Rarely does a film of this kind maintain such a steadfastly objective gaze. Director Donal Mac Intyre utilizes the unprecedented access given him by Noonan and his family, complemented by a rocking soundtrack and deft editing, to craft a riveting portrait of an exceedingly charming gangster who both lives up to and shatters the usual stereotypes.