Outlaw

Ethically obnoxious and temperamentally hateful, ‘Outlaw’ is a pumped-up apologia for vigilantism wrapped in the bloody rags of a gangland caper. Writer-director Nick Love’s regular lead Danny Dyer (‘The Football Factory’, ‘The Business’) partially modifies his usual wide-boy shtick as Gene, a City trader whose off-the-peg perfect life (blonde fiancée, penthouse apartment) is disrupted by a body- and ego-bruising encounter with feral thugs. Needful of reassurance and vengeance, he falls in with a motley collective led by Bryant (Sean Bean), a charismatic but at least half-mad ex-serviceman who feels the country has gone to the dogs; also involved are disgruntled ex-cop Bob Hoskins, bereaved barrister Lennie James, battered student Rupert Friend and CCTV creep Sean Harris. What starts out as the London branch of Fight Club soon bends towards ‘street justice’, becoming a gang on the lam – but, it’s suggested, one with grass-roots support for their sociopathic spree. According to Love, ‘Outlaw’ had its origins in his and others’ concerns about real-life violence, but the result yokes laughably incredible genre action to tabloid scare-mongering of the most objectionable kind: a self-appointed death squad takes arms against a cartoonishly corrupt criminal justice system in cahoots with caricature mafiosi; torture and murder become problematic only when taken ‘too far’; and while women’s security is cited as a major concern, their screen presence amounts to two minutes’ window dressing. What were the capable cast thinking?