Rent Villain (1971)

Good, Solid British Gangster Film - Villain review by GI

Villain sits as one of the series of London crime films of the 1970s and ranks alongside The Long Good Friday (1980). Richard Burton plays Vic Dakin, an embodiment of the Kray twins, a gay, London gangster who is a violent psychopath but obsessively loves his ageing mother. With his crew he rules by terror and when he plans and executes an armed robbery that doesn't go well Scotland Yard are soon on his tail. Burton seems a strange choice for the part and his performance was criticised as somewhat over the top but viewed today he captures the, perhaps hyped, portrayal of the violent London gangster from the 60s and 70s. At the time this was an especially risqué film with it's language and portrayal of sexual violence including the controlling gay relationship Vic enjoys with his young protegé Wolf (Ian McShane). The story encompasses corruption, police rule breaking (and in this sense its clearly an influence on the iconic TV series The Sweeney) and it highlights the control such criminals had on their territories in London. This film has a good eye for the rundown state of Britain's capital in these times and has those characters such as the bent car dealer, the seedy police informant, strippers, and even a depraved MP ripe for blackmail. A gripping, adult crime film that has that unique English realism that makes these films so good and make them somewhat nostalgic to watch today. The support cast includes Nigel Davenport, Colin Welland and Donald Sinden. This is a top British film of the 70s and one to check out if you've never seen it.

Never quite the sum of its parts. - Villain review by TE

This is an interesting enough entry into the British crime movie genre, but more for its historical context than its success as a movie.

An excellent cast seems to struggle with a laboured script and a narrative that is often too indebted to the story of the Krays (the mother adoration, the violence of the repressed homosexuality etc).

In some ways it is not 'nasty' enough: it just doesn't have the edge of 'Get Carter' or 'Performance'.

Cult Crime. - Villain review by Steve

Violent but irresistible gangster film scripted by Dick Clement and Ian La Frenais which contains so much comedy that it sometimes feels like a Spinal Tap spoof of The Sweeney. Its premise is that these crooks have the same humdrum concerns as everyone else, they just happen to be in organised crime. Where only the most ruthless and grotesque get to the top.

In an astonishing performance, Richard Burton plays a psychopathic cockney gang leader, modelled on both of the Kray twins. So he's a mother-fixated homosexual in a sadomasochistic relationship with a bisexual Ian McShane. He's a complete dunce, but not quite as witless as the rest of his gang. This stuff is as extraordinary as it sounds.

It's a cult film. The violence makes it a guilty pleasure, but the nasty stuff takes place off camera. It captures grubby London in that post industrial period when it felt like the country was in steep decline and nothing worked anymore. So, a lot like now. It's a city of derelict warehouses and ugly new concrete by-passes.

A decade earlier this would have been a B film in b&w, but this is in Technicolor and Panavision and features a real star. Wearing aftershave and a polyester shirt! Changes in censorship permitted new levels of brutality and swearing. It wasn't a hit but found an audience on tv. Who surely wondered what on earth they had just seen.