Four Lions

FOUR LIONS(15)

D: Chris Morris

Optimum/Drafthouse/Film4/Wild Bunch/Warp (Mark Herbert & Derrin Schlesinger)

UK 🇬🇧 2010

97 mins

Comedy

W: Chris Morris, Jesse Armstrong & Sam Bain

DP: Lol Crawley

Ed: Billy Sneddon

Riz Ahmed (Omar), Kayvan Novak (Waj), Nigel Lindsay (Barry), Adeel Akhtar (Faisal), Arsher Ali (Hassan)

Four Lions is a satirical comedy which tackles a very politically-charged and fractious subject, that of Islamic extremism in both the UK and in the Middle East, and though it pokes fun and ridicules suicide bombers, the non-serious approach to the material also makes the film a little bit pointless.

The story follows four British Muslims who become so engaged in their religious beliefs that they plan to rage terror on the streets of Britain, culminating in a bungled attack at the London Marathon.

Admittedly, the performances of the four incompetent terrorists are good, and there are one or two amusing moments, but it doesn't provide any real belly laughs and treads quite carefully so not to offend anyone and ultimately falls between two stools of being both politically correct and not.

Certainly worth a watch, but nowhere near as good as it could have been.

6/10