"Lock, Stock And Two Smoking Barrels" Revisited

Rating: 2/10 (3 January 2001)

In 1998, when "Lock, Stock..." came out, Ritchie was relatively unknown, and that was part of the charm of the movie. The comedy was refreshing, evenso with visual effects and story teller tricks; the great surprise was the "everyone"-finale. The movie was an alternative and commercial hit, which is not an everyday achievement. The conception of "Snatch", however, cannot be driven by anything different from commercialism: it is an exact copy of "Lock, Stock..."; Ritchie didn't even try to hide it. Plot, characters and effects are exactly alike - to give an example, the only change made to Vinnie Jones' character in "Lock, Stock..." is the name. What makes it even worse, is that Ritchie needs visually not entertaining features (stills, name-tags, arrows) to tell his story. Two highlights, however, are the performances of Alan Ford and Mike Reid: as evil as can be, and therefore entertaining.