16 + GUIDE - British Film Institute

Gangster No.1 (2000) Dir. Paul McGuigan
Journal Articles
SIGHT AND SOUND
vol.10 no.8. August 2000, p.6
Film news: redundant reviews
This brief article questions why GANGSTER NO.1 did so badly at the box office despite good
reviews, while the similar LOVE, HONOUR AND OBEY took two million pounds despite it being
“reviled”. Amongst the reasons given for this anomaly, was that firstly, not enough was spent
on the marketing, the timing of its release was wrong (Euro 2000 had started) and that it was
caught in a backlash against the current British gangster films.
SIGHT AND SOUND
vol.10 no.7. July 2000, pp.45-46
Gangster no.1, by Mark Kermode
Kermode’s review of the film describes it as “a handsomely ugly affair” and picks up on the
juxtapositions within the film and the crime underworld it depicts.
Press Articles
INDEPENDENT ON SUNDAY
13 th August 2000, p.1
Crime on film, and off, doesn’t pay, by Jason Nisse
A convoluted but interesting article that looks at the disappointing box office takings of
GANGSTER NO.1 and of the involvement of Richard Thompson, whose company, Civilian
Content had bought the films production company, Pagoda.
NEW STATESMAN
12 th June 2000, pp.45-46
Dying cult, by Jonathan Romney
This article has Romney noting the Oedipal/father figure obsessed qualities of recent British
gangster films, before going on to review GANGSTER NO.1. While applauding the film for
being better than a lot of recent British gangster films, in that it does not go for cheap laughs,
it is still to some extent style-obsessed, and while “several cuts above the rest…it’s still not
much more than a dazzling parade of dead bad dads”.
THE GUARDIAN
9 th June 2000, p.4
Street fighting man, by Peter Bradshaw
Describing how the “talentless lottery gangster film has pretty well become a contemporary
cultural crisis” Bradshaw applauds GANGSTER NO.1 for being “a film with a canny yet
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