It’s easy to knock Noel Clarke. The first reason, being the bright young thing of the UK film scene, he most probably has Danny Dyer’s mobile number on speed dial having starred with the feckless wonder on two occasions. Secondly, walking amoebas like Peter Andre cite him as “a hero”. Thirdly he won the Orange Rising Star BAFTA, sandwiched between unworthy victors Shia The Beef and Kristen Stewart.
So it’d be easy to knock Noel Clarke. Easy, but wrong. Look beneath the rather attractive surface and he’s actually the definition of a grafter. The youngest looking 35-year-old on God’s green Earth he has the whiff of a meteroic rise about him even if the facts speak otherwise. Stints in British shit TV staples such as Casualty, The Bill and even Doctors litter his early career until he pulled himself a Good Will Hunting and decided to write a film based on his life experiences. Success, both financial and critical, swiftly followed.
Kidulthood will have it’s detractors. It featured “Nah wat I mean bruv?” dialogue that usually ushers a reply of “Well not really my dear” from anyone outside of London who wasn’t talk to speak English via SMS and it featured the kind of dramatic teenage years that even Skins script-writers may consider a tad far-fetched. It was, if nothing else, refreshingly different.
Yes, gritty ‘Urban’ film fare was popping up all over the mid-noughties with the mass regularity of a happy slap, but while films such as Bullet Boy (feat. Ashley Waters of So Solid Crew in a performance much better than you could possibly dream it would be) and A Way of Life both really laid on the truth of their protagonists, Kidulthood revelled in its cinematic qualities.
ADD style camerawork, a soundtrack with more BPM’s than a hummingbird and the aforementioned (at times non-sensical) script made Kidulthood something we Brits do far too rarely. It made Kidulthood unique cinema.
Back in the US of A, during the 90′s there was a wave of indie film titles, Clerks, Go, Slackers, etc, all films that we in the U of K stepped away fom even attempting to make. Why? There was nothing inherently American about these films. The idea of teenagers getting upto highjinks in funny, sometimes dramatic ways is global. But we just stood on this side of the pond staring. Making do with sub-Tarantino ripoffs in the form of Guy Ricthie films. Followed by sub-Ritchie films in the form of Danny Dyer movies and so-on.
Noel Clarke, love him or hate him, didn’t so much stop this trend as just ignored it. He did what every young film-maker should, he made a film he wanted to see. He (along with Menhaj Huda) didn’t make a film based on what they thought other people wanted, they didn’t simply try to copy someone they admired, instead they created something personal but with a simple moral message; Violence on the streets will get you nowhere.
After Kidulthood came Adulthood and with it a miss-step. While the first film spent two not so subtle hours telling us how violence never solved anything, the sequel projected the message “Sometimes waving a gun in someones face can do you wonders”. Yet even this analysis is open to debate. I tried to suggest to a friend recently that the Kidult naivety says “Violence is Bad” whilst the more mature Adult follow-up remarks that “Violence is nessesary”. Whoever was right, (most probably my friend) the fact of the matter is that rarely does a British youth movie stir up any kind of debate futher than “Dat bird was well fit innit”.
Which brings us up to date with 4.3.2.1. (currently in cinemas). It USP, and something that even it’s most ardent nay-sayers have to give it kudos for, is that it’s a film about four women, yet for everyone. Wait, isn’t there another film currently at the cinema about four women? Well yes, but the 4.3.2.1‘s don’t just spend their onscreen time talking about shoes and cock. To distance itself even more, not that it needs to, it also features some actual skin colour, somewhat lacking in the female freak show that is Sex and the City 2.
4.3.2.1 is far from flawless. Plot holes and thin dialogue raise more than a few eyebrows and some of the actions of the main characters provoke angry hackles of rage but on the whole it’s intentions, Noel Clarke’s intentions, are pure. Film-makers, young, old, black, white, rich or poor can make movies. About anything they want.
In a British film industry full of mockney gangsters, Curtis insipid rom-coms and grittier than thou real life dramas, Clarke’s is a voice both entertaining and unique. Praise Noel indeed.
