The Gentlemen (2019) crimes crime in a great British way

The Gentlemen is an on point hilarious crime film worth a view.

Written and Directed by Guy Ritchie (Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels)

Starring Matthew McConaughey (Lock Stock and Magic Mike), Charlie Hunnam (Lock Stock and the Sons of Anarchy) Michelle Dockery (Lock Stock and Downton Abbey)

Crime movies are damn good fun. A bunch of nare-do-wells, often with impulse control and intelligence issues, all after the most base human desires: money, power, and sex. Damn good fun, as well Guy Ritchie knew when he made Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels. Now he's back, a more mature filmmaker back in the London underworld with The Gentlemen.

     Mickey (McConaughey), one of the biggest pot dealers in England, is selling his business. In start the plots with a Chinese group moving in, a buyer feeling remorse, and a young group of fighters causing mayhem. Told within a framing device of journalist Fletcher (Grant) trying to sell evidence to Raymond (Hunnam), everything spirals into blood and death amid hilarious antics

      All around this movie is everyone having fun. From the shots to the acting to the writing, all of this is a tight crime flick bubbling over with enthusiastic joy. Feeling like a mad older brother of Lock Stock and In Bruges, The Gentlemen moves along with clockwork timing, if that clock's hands were in constant conflict trying to kill one another.

     See this one in a theater right away, or wherever you can as soon as possible.

Here are my notes; beware spoilers

How we got here meets Framing Device

We start with Mickey getting shot, this being a "how we got here" type story, with the end result our framing device of Fletcher telling Ray the full backstory. This could have been confusing as all hell, but Ritchie makes it work.

Hugh damn Grant

We are living in a damn Grant- reconnaissance and it feels like people are missing it. Dude's doing some of the best work of his life.

Kung Fu Rap Thieves

I love these bastards and Colin Ferrell as their leader.

Fuckery afoot

It's a fun mess of a script, and lines like this make it just a joy to watch.

Death's mostly self inflicted

Through much of the movie, lots of the deaths aren't the fault of anyone. They are happenstance, the products of ill-gotten lives and accidents. Of course, then some people get quite pointedly shot, so there's that.

Pig Fucker

Nothing like using a Black Mirror episode about man-on-pig love and using it as a joke. It's pretty dark, but damn it is very funny.

Pound of Flesh

Now this is damn dark, but a fitting end the the architect of everyone's problems throughout the story. Just dark and evil.