It Was an Accident
UK/France 2000
Reviewed by Edward Lawrenson
Synopsis
Our synopses give away the plot in full, including surprise twists.
Walthamstow, the present. On release from prison, Nicky Burkett is determined to stay out of trouble. At the local post office, he prevents an armed robbery, angering Mickey Cousins, the criminal behind the heist. Nicky starts courting Noreen Hurlock, daughter of policeman George. He is also offered money by the shady Fitch to carry out an unspecified violent job. After an encounter with Mickey, Nicky meets Rameez, who heads up a rival gang. Rameez, who's dating Nicky's sister Sharon, offers Nicky a job which he declines.
Believing that Rameez ordered a stop to the post-office robbery, Mickey burns down one of his warehouses; Rameez has his lackey Javed damage the cars in Mickey's showcourt. Javed does so, but implicates Nicky who is arrested, then set free. After being pursued by Mickey in a car chase, Noreen dumps Nicky. Desperate, Nicky approaches Fitch who tells him he wants Rameez killed. Nicky takes the money which he plans to spend on his son Danny's music tuition. Before he can tell Rameez about Fitch's hit, Nicky is involved in another post-office heist and taken to the police station for questioning. Against racist cop Holdsworth's wishes, George lets Nicky go. Noreen, meanwhile, is attacked by Fitch; Nicky vows revenge, but is picked up by Rameez's men and taken to Walthamstow dog track. There, Nicky explains himself to Rameez, who is dissuaded from killing him by Sharon. Nicky spots Fitch and pursues him. Confronting the old man, Nicky accidentally fires his gun - which he bought earlier - and kills him. George, who turned up before Holdsworth, testifies to Nicky's innocence.
Review
In one of It Was an Accident's few scenes of violence, Nicky Burkett, the hapless ex-con trying to go straight in present-day Walthamstow, is set upon by Mickey, the small-time gangster he unwittingly offended. We expect a dramatic showdown, but instead debut director Metin Hüseyin plays it for laughs, with quick-tempered Mickey turning on his underlings as Nicky slips off unharmed. It's typical of Hüseyin (whose television credits include Common as Muck) and screenwriter Ol Parker's insistently comic take on Nicky's struggle to stay out of jail that the scene should end in the stuff of physical farce. This jokey looseness can be a problem for the film. Mickey and his rival Rameez are, for the most part, more buffoonish than threatening, and while Hüseyin may be using humour here to deflate their egos (as in the lovely moment when a train of passing market stalls blocks Mickey's strut to his car), the result kills the tension at crucial points. Nevertheless, this sprightly, light-hearted tone is also what makes It Was an Accident so endearing, a refreshing change from the laboured black humour of so many contemporary British crime movies. Otherwise ordinary locations are given a subtly surreal twist by Hüseyin and DoP Guy Dufaux (a dreamlike night-time car chase in the local woods ends up in a field full of cattle); and the stylised dialogue is rich in choice one-liners.
One of the film's best jokes is when Fitch, the older white man who pays Nicky (who's black) to kill Asian gang-leader Rameez for racist reasons, says he used to drive for the Krays. He delivers the line surrounded by a crowd of similar middle-aged East Enders who raise a Spartacus-like chorus, claiming likewise. It's a funny scene, but it also feels like a riposte to the likes of Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels which quite happily fetishise the trappings of (exclusively white) 60s gangsterism. Significantly, when Fitch attacks Nicky's girlfriend Noreen with a knife, it's one of the two moments when the film's ineffably jokey tone gives way to something more serious, the other being racist cop Holdsworth's threat to frame Nicky: "It's a race thing," Noreen says after Fitch cuts her. It Was an Accident is too effortlessly insouciant to ram the point home. But as you wait for the gags to start up, you can't help thinking that dodgy geezers such as Rameez and Mickey, who act as if they've strolled in fresh from a Fast Show sketch, are the least of Nicky's worries.
Credits
- Director
- Metin Hüseyin
- Producer
- Paul Goodman
- Screenplay
- Ol Parker
- Based on the novel by
- Jeremy Cameron
- Director of Photography
- Guy Dufaux
- Editor
- Annie Kocur
- Production Designer
- Joseph Bennett
- Music
- Courtney Pine
- ©Pathé Fund Limited
- Production Companies
- Pathé Pictures presents
- in association with the Arts Council of England and Le Studio Canal+ a Litmus production
- Supported by the National Lottery through the Arts Council of England
- Executive Producers
- Alexis Lloyd
- Andrea Calderwood
- David Barron
- Line Producer
- Guy Tannahill
- Associate Producer
- Ol Parker
- Executive in Charge of Production
- Pathé:
- Natasha Ross
- Development Executive
- Pathé:
- Ruth McCance
- Production Co-ordinator
- Kelly Howard-Garde
- Unit Manager
- Jonathan Hook
- Location Manager
- Ian Aegis
- Post-production
- Supervisor:
- Louise Seymour
- Consultant:
- Steve Barker
- Assistant Directors
- Richard Whelan
- Sara Desmond
- Vicky Marks
- Script Supervisor
- Sue Hills
- Casting
- Directors:
- Abi Cohen Casting
- Jina Jay
- ADR Voice:
- Louis Elman
- Steadicam Operator
- Alf Tramontin
- Special Effects Technicians
- Bob Hollow
- Stuart Murdoch
- Supervising Art Director
- Andrew Rothschild
- Set Decorator
- Charlotte Watts
- Costume Designer
- Susannah Buxton
- Costume Supervisor
- Nigel Egerton
- Wardrobe Master
- David Cantwell
- Make-up/Hair Designer
- Christine Allsopp
- Chief Hairdresser
- Tony Lilley
- Make-up/Hair Artist
- Hanna Coles
- Titles
- Robot
- Score Performers
- Saxophones/Clarinets/ Flutes/Keyboards/
Percussion/Programming: - Courtney Pine
- Guitars:
- Cameron Pierre
- Percussion:
- Thomas Dyani
- Turntables:
- Jay King
- French Horn:
- Clare Lintot
- Trombone:
- Dennis Rollins
- Drums:
- Robert Fordbour
- Music Supervisor
- Louise Hammar
- Score Production
- Courtney Pine
- Adrian Sherwood
- Score Mixer
- Steve Reece
- Sound Recording
- John Pritchard
- Re-recording Mixer
- Paul Hamblin
- Supervising Sound Editor
- Catherine Hodgson
- Additional Sound Editors
- Ben Norrington
- Stewart Henderson
- Dialogue Editor
- Andre Schmidt
- ADR
- Mixers:
- David Sloss
- Ted Swanscott
- David Humphries
- Darren McQuade
- Foley
- Artists:
- Dianne Greaves
- Jason Swanscott
- Editor:
- Michael Redfern
- Stunt Co-ordinator
- Wayne Michaels
- Cast
- Chiwetel Ejiofor
- Nicky Burkett
- Max Beesley
- Mickey Cousins
- James Bolam
- Fitch
- Nicola Stapleton
- Kelly
- Neil Dudgeon
- Holdsworth
- Hugh Quarshie
- George Hurlock
- Thandie Newton
- Noreen Hurlock
- Jacqueline Williams
- Sharon Burkett
- Sidh Solanki
- Rameez
- Cavan Clerkin
- Jimmy Foley
- Sally Chattaway
- Terri
- Paul Chowdhry
- Rafiq Roy
- Kolade Agboke
- Gaz
- Johnny Harris
- Robbie
- Anita Kapoor
- Rafiq's Mum
- Jeff Innocent
- Alan
- Shaun Stone
- 'Killer' Bloke
- Rhydian Jai-Persaud
- Aftab Malik
- Fraser Ayres
- Dean Longmuire
- Jeff Mirza
- Tariq
- Louis-Rae Beadle
- Danny Burkett
- Alan Hireson
- Troy
- Saikat Ahamed
- Ahmad
- Tej Patel
- Javed
- Paul Sharma
- Asif
- Evelyn Doggart
- Sophie
- Jacqui-Lee Pryce
- Lexi
- Sarfraz Buxy
- Faizal
- Kate Magowan
- doctor
- Chris Gee
- Graham
- Norby West
- Harry
- Munir Khairdin
- Mahmoud
- Ivan Marevich
- Brjan
- Certificate
- 18
- Distributor
- Pathé Distribution
- 9,067 feet
- 100 minutes 45 seconds
- Dolby
- In Colour