Hooligans and Thugs
Soccer’s Most Violent Fan Fights
with Steve Jones, Gilbert Montoya
Directed by Ian Carrington
(BBF Media/Koch Vision)
by Duke Crevanator
I was so looking forward to watching this DVD. I went out to the bar for a couple of hours beforehand to get properly lubed up, sat down on the couch, and got ready for some sweet ultra-violence.
How disappointed I was. Violence there certainly is, but it’s so poorly presented that I was quite ready to start a riot myself, preferably in the offices of BBF Media. Except in a couple of places, there’s nothing but a constant barrage of riot footage taken either by security cameras, or wobbly hand-helds. That part is understandable, but the clips they show are so short that before you can even come close to fully ascertaining what the fuck is going on, they cut to a clip from a different riot in another country. If you’re lucky, they may even say where the riot took place and when.
The other annonying thing is that it’s hosted by Steve Jones (of Sex Pistols and Belinda Carlisle fame). He does his best to be amusing, but they really needed a better script writer, or perhaps they needed any script writer, it’s hard to tell which. Is it just me, or does Steve Jones sitting on the crapper in a suit of armor make no sense at all? And believe me, it doesn’t come across as amusing in a Monty Python kind of way either, it’s just stupid. He really adds nothing to the whole proceeding, and I highly doubt having his name on the cover is going to garner many more sales here in the U.S..
The most laughable part is in the intro, they go out of their way to say how scary the footage is, how it shows how horrible people can be, and hopefully, we can all learn something from watching this. Jesus H Christ, at least be honest, you’re trying to make money by appealing to the lowest aspects of voyeurism short of the Faces of Death series! Perhaps it’s just for legal reasons, but either way, that speech is laugh-out-loud funny, especially when you see the cover of the DVD.
With all my criticism stated, there is a certain appeal, but not enough to actually buy this. However, if you see it as a cheap rental, or in a used/bargain bin and have some extra cash to spend, it may be worth your while. I mean, as disgusted as I was with the production values, I did still get a kick out of seeing Euro-trash and South Americans beat the living shit out of each other for an hour.
(www.kochvision.com)
