Hard Boiled Sweets Review

Hard Boiled Sweets is the latest in a slew of low-budget wide-boy crime capers to grace our cinema screens. Set amongst the arcades and donkey rides of Southend-on-Sea, this is Elmore Leonard writing The Only Way is Essex. We’re treated to an identity parade of hard-boiled stereotypes; the flaky old villains, the desperate ex-cons and the easy girls with ‘earts o’ gold. When local don Jimmy the Gent (Peter Wight) comes to town, they all hatch a plan to relieve him of his swag. A couple of stylised conceits and “arch” monologues can’t hide a poorly structured and increasingly cynical film bereft of humour or suspense. The truth is, the days of Bob Hoskins - and even Guy Ritchie - are over. Mockney gangsters once ruled the Albion, but this genre has taken a long swim off the end of the pier.