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Bonded By Blood (DVD)

by Roger Smith | January 11, 2011 11:27 | Edited January 11, 2011 11:31

"...makes for violently entertaining, if slightly familiar, viewing."

In another retelling of the case of the infamous Essex Boys murders of the mid-nineties (previously scratched over on the big screen in 2007's propulsively violent Rise Of The Foot Soldier and the 2000 Sean Bean-starrer Essex Boys), actor turned director Sacha Bennett's (Tuesday, Devilwood) grimy crime drama Bonded By Blood puts a slightly different spin on the brutal events, which rank as London's most notorious gangland myth outside of the antics of The Kray Twins in the sixties.

 

Based upon the book by former Essex Boys "associate" Bernard O'Mahoney, Bonded By Blood focuses on Darren Nicholls (Adam Deacon), who went from low level dealer to supergrass.

 

Beginning in the late eighties, the film charts the rise to power of hardmen Pat Tate (Tamer Hassan), Tony Tucker (Terry Stone) and Craig Rolfe (Neil Maskell). With the help of drug importers Mikey Steele (Vincent Regan) and Jack Whomes (Dave Legeno), the trio become the biggest drug dealers in the south of England, and ruled the criminal underworld with an iron fist.

 

While Bonded By Blood offers nothing new - and in fact seems to signify the growth of a new strand of British direct-to-DVD crime flicks - it still makes for violently entertaining, if slightly familiar, viewing.