ATTACK THE BLOCK (2011)

ATTACK THE BLOCK (2011)

Tagline: Inner City vs. Outer Space

(Action, Sci-Fi, Glow In The Dark Teeth) [R]

Even if it is an alien invasion, they're four foot high, blind and got kicked to death by a bunch of kids. We got nothing to worry about.

In this one, a gang of kids in South London finds an alien and decides to hunt it down and kill it. In the process, they end up attracting a larger group of aliens that are also larger in size. They end up being arrested by the police after Sam reports that they mugged her earlier in the evening, but they are all attacked by aliens and the arrest goes badly. Over the course of the night, a truce must be made between Sam and the gang members if they want to survive. The aliens aren’t the only ones after them. Moses the gang leader has angered another gang member in the area who now wants Moses dead. 

I think one of the things that stands out in this flick is that if you don’t know South London street slang, this is going to be a rough watch if you are worried about dialog all that much. I picked up most of it because I have watched a lot of this type of stuff over the years, but for some people, it might be better to have the subtitles turned on. Typically, in a situation like this where every other word seems to be profanity, I would say that the writer just didn’t have a vocabulary, but Joe Cornish was trying to capture the authenticity of the kids in the area. It wasn’t just throwing every cuss word into the script that he could to try and be edgy or cool. He actually was inspired to write the story based on a combination of getting mugged himself and realizing how scared his muggers were and watching the movie SIGNS. Cornish is responsible for writing some big films including ANT-MAN and THE KID WHO WOULD BE KING. 

Another thing about this movie that separates it from a lot of the more modern alien invasion flicks is that they used practical effects whenever they could. The aliens weren’t overdone, they basically looked like black bears with glow-in-the-dark neon teeth and slobber. Yeah, these things are just slobbering all over the place. 

When the movie started I was thinking that it was going to ben early impossible for me to embrace any of the characters because they were literally gang members terrorizing Sam, but over time you start to see what’s really going on, and all of the characters are given character growth which is wildly unusual in an alien invasion movie. Usually, it’s like “The aliens have landed, let’s freakin fight!!!!!!!!”. There really isn’t any time to get to the minutia of actual character building and all of that stuff that adds richness to a film. 

This movie was actually John Boyega’s big hit prior to landing the role of Finn in the STAR WARS franchise. He was very good in this. I also liked Jodie Whittaker in this as Sam. I haven’t watched any of the episodes with her as DOCTOR WHO, but I have heard they are pretty solid. I thought Leeon Jones was solid in this as Jerome as well. It looks like this was the only acting role he’s done. I did not like Franz Drameh in this as Dennis, but he's gone on to do some other great roles which include “Firestorm” in CW’s DC shows. Alex Esmail is good in this as Pest. He went on to continue acting through 2019. 

When it comes to the pacing this thing is nearly perfect and the soundtrack and score are pretty solid. It is also well shot and has a lot of funny moments that complement the heartwarming ones. I could have done without all the profanity and there are a few scenes with pot involved, but it does come across as authentic and not shoved into film. I freaking hate drugs and typically can’t stand movies with them in them, if they are glorifying drugs, but this thing isn’t really doing that. 

Overall this is a good one and it does make you think which I liked a lot. Kind of a “don’t judge a book by its cover” story only with aliens. If you saw RIM OF THE WORLD which is kind of a loose remake of this, then just know ATTACK THE BLOCK is a more competent movie than that one. 

This one gets a solid 5 out of 7. 

GRAPHICS ARE THE PROPERTY OF SCREEN GEMS AND ARE USED FOR REVIEW PURPOSES ONLY.