Variety
"Yardie" has the right look, the right sound and the right moves to play with the bigger boys of its genre; like its young, scrappy but naive hero, however, there's not quite enough power behind its posturing.
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Yardie
Idris Elba gets behind the camera for this Sundance Grand Jury Prize-nominated crime drama based on Victor Headley's novel of the same name.
"On a hot night in Kingston, Jamaica, 1973, Jerry Dread (Everaldo Creary, Better Mus' Come) stops the music at an outdoor party to encourage a truce between warring gangs. His little brother Denis looks on from the crowd as an assassin's bullet rings out, taking Jerry’s life. A decade later, Denis is the right-hand man to gang boss Fox, who sends him on a loyalty-testing mission to London. But when the mission goes wrong, Denis hides out with an old flame and decides to find his brother’s killer." (Sundance Film Festival)
2018Rating: MA15+, Strong violence and coarse language101 minsUK
CrimeDrama
- Director:
- Idris Elba (feature debut)
- Writer:
- Brock Norman BrockMartin Stellman
- Cast:
- Aml AmeenAkin GaziMark SmithNaomi AckieStephen GrahamFraser JamesShantol JacksonPhilips Nortey
Yardie / Reviews
The Times
Cosy clichés such as these undercut the rawness of the material - which is a shame, because Elba's visual sense and handling of actors suggest a strong future behind the camera. At least it shows he's human.
Full reviewThe Guardian
Ahead, its own distinctive, rewarding path; on all other sides, several hundred yards of crime-movie cliche. At most of these junctures, Elba makes the right choice.
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Screen Daily
Although Elba stretches the narrative to its limits, this is a nicely-shot, -cast and -told period story of black Britain - when so few exist - with a geniality that cuts through some of its bleaker moments.
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Little White Lies
Enjoyable, but so deeply conventional that it feels a little played out.
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Hollywood Reporter
It's a pedestrian effort that could have used a serious hit of Elba's dangerous charisma onscreen.
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Empire Magazine
Neither a luridly enjoyable piece of Scarface-style pulp or a nuanced genre subversion, Idris Elba's directorial debut is a fitfully entertaining 1980s gangster thriller.
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