Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels

So this movie came out in 1998. I did not realize that until I turned it on today and started looking up images for this review.

The funny part is that actually put a little bit more credibility in the movie for me.

I saw this poster

Didn't recognize any of the characters except Vinnie Jones and that didn't put any stock in the movie for me.

I hadn't heard of this movie, I didn't know any of the actors, I thought it was released in the 2000's, a time that if I hadn't seen it or heard of it, chances are it wasn't that good. Oh and I also thought it was American made.

I was wrong on almost all fronts.

Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels is British Comedy thriller, made in 1998, and was apparently well known for  its time.

But was it good?

This movie was mostly best known for being one of Guy Ritchie, the guy who would eventually direct Sherlock Holmes.

It was also well known for being the movie that started Vinnie Jone's career as well as Jason Statham's.

Now I don't think I've done a review of a movie with Jason Statham and there's a reason for that. His movies aren't very good. I think I want to like Jason Statham but he keeps on doing movies that are just complete shit. Transporter, Death Race, etc.

Now of course there are some movies that he had been apart of that have been good. I don't think that's because of him but for the most part, I'm not the biggest fan of Statham.

But what about Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrel's?

The story follows four friends who are able to gather up 100,000 pounds to place in a high stakes card game. The card game of course is run by a British gangster. Well the guy from this group of friends playing loses and ends up owing money to this British gangster. In order to pay back this gangster, these guys orchestrate an elaborate heist to rip off a gang that lives next door to them.

The gang plans to rob a group of weed dealers. The group of friends plans to rip them off of the weed. When they get the weed, they plan to sell it back to the supplier.

All the while, the British gangster wants a pair of antique shotgun rifles. So his enforcer hires a pair of petty criminals to steal the rifles. But they accidentally sell the rifles to the group of friends, mistaking them for run of the mill rifles.

All while, there's a hitman (played by Vinnie Jones) who is hired by the gangster to eventually take care of the group of friends if they don't pay him off.

It sounds confusing and the movie does take a little bit to get used to because of the dry British humor and large cast of characters.

However, the movie is pretty fun because once you figure out the different characters and different sets of them, you start to see how their paths are going to cross and you wonder who is going to be alive at the end of the movie.

I've never seen Smokin' Aces all the way through but its a similar concept to that. You've got a bunch of Assassins trying to kill this one guy and you just have to wonder who is going to end up on top.

Now I don't know how well they did it in Smokin' Aces but I know they did a really good job with it in Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Rifles.

Its a movie about crime in England but at the same time, its a comedy. When the movie wants to be funny, its pretty funny.

It kind of has that Tarantino style of humor where something will be going on but one of the characters will be hung up on small little details, or a situation seems to be easily fixed but it just isn't due to the stupidity of the characters, or something goes wrong.

Some flaws in the movie are things I've mentioned before. There are a lot of characters and as you can see from the summary I gave of the movie, I don't know most if any of their names. I eventually just started calling them either by their actor's names or by a character trait. For example, I'd call the group of friends, Statham and the gang, even though Jason Statham was a minor character compared to others. The British gangster I would call just that, or the old guy. The dialogue was so fast and there were so many characters that I couldn't always keep track of them.

I enjoyed Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels. Luckily I was delightfully surprised from the notions I had before I knew what the movie was actually about.

So have you seen Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels? Are you a Jason Statham fan? Comment and discuss below.

I'll leave you with this. I'm not a huge fan of Jimmy Fallon but when I saw he was playing War the card game with Jason Statham... with water, I had to put this up.