The gruff, broken leading man on a revenge rampage genre has had its fair share of ups and downs across film history. You’ve got the highlights with films like Shane Meadows’ grueling Dead Man’s Shoes come to mind, and then the lowlights where bland cliche reigns; any post-2010 Liam Neeson action flick fits the bill here. Jamie Childs’ feature debut Jackdaw sits plum in the middle of that spectrum, as his moody gangster-adjacent Smoggie crime thriller doesn’t quite do enough to accommodate for the retreading of familiar action beats but delivers a steady stream of satisfying thrills.
Set across a night in Teesside, the electric hue of the power plant never far from the background, Jack Dawson (Oliver Jackson-Cohen, The Invisible Man) must scrap his way through the criminal underworld to rescue his younger brother Simon (Leon Harrop). An army veteran and former motocross champion under the pseudonym Jackdaw, Jack returns to his native beans-on-toast homeland to care for his brother. Struggling for cash, he has to make a final run for gangster wannabe Silas (Joe Blakemore).
This review was posted on January 24th 2024. Full review linked below.
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