A friend of mine once amusingly proposed a festival of wholly
mediocre films — think of the most entirely passable yet still utterly
forgettable movies possible, like Intersection,
movies with absolutely no kitsch value — and we proceeded to kill a beer or two
coming up with the perfectly nondescript lineup. Since then I’ve on occasion thought
up other bizarre, commercially nonviable festival lineups (movies in which the
leads hooked up off screen, films with multiple Arquettes, a retrospective of
Daniel Baldwin), and it occurred to recently me while watching British import Johnny Was that it could be programmed
alongside Johnny Suede, Johnny Mnemonic, Johnny English, Johnny West
and Johnny Skidmarks to create a whole
festival of rotten Johnnies.

that
bad, but Johnny Was is certainly no
great shakes, despite its wildly eclectic cast. Penned by Brendan Foley and
directed by Mark Hammond, the film is set in the bare-knuckle London
burgh of Brixton, where the titular ex-thug (darkly charismatic toughie Vinnie
Jones, above right) is trying to escape his violent past. Johnny’s poorly chosen place of idyllic
settling, though, is a flat sandwiched between a crime den run by a Jamaican
gangster (Eriq LaSalle) and pirate radio station operated by a Rastafarian
deejay (former boxer Lennox Lewis, above left). When Johnny’s ex-partner (Patrick Bergin,
awakened from sleeping with the enemy), freshly escaped from prison, comes
knocking on his door, looking to pull Johnny back into his old ways and finish derailing
the Irish peace process, Johnny must try to play both sides in an effort to
stay alive and protect the ones he loves.

Johnny Was belongs
easily to the modernist tradition of grubby, mashed-up British urban crime tales that
have trailed in the wake of Guy Ritchie’s one-two debut punch of Lock, Stock & Two Smoking Barrels
and Snatch. Thing is, it’s not quite
as colorful and fleet of foot. The cast has enough intrigue value — Samantha
Mumba also costars as Rita, Johnny’s new flame, and rocker Roger Daltry plays
Jimmy, his former boss — to make for some interesting clashes, but Foley’s
script telegraphs its intentions, Hammond shoots with a small frame, and the
action sequences are less than thrilling. For more forgiving fans of this oeuvre,
there are a few delights to be found within, but for general audiences there’s
little of essentiality. The film is presented in 1.78:1 widescreen, with an
English language 5.1 Dolby digital audio track and optional Spanish subtitles.
The only supplemental extras are a clutch of preview trailers for other First
Look home video releases. C- (Movie) C- (Disc)