Green Street

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Green Street Hooligans

Green Street DVD cover
Directed by Lexi Alexander
Produced by Donald Zuckerman
Deborah Del Prete
Written by Lexi Alexander
Brad Smith
Josh Shelov
Starring Elijah Wood
Charlie Hunnam
Claire Forlani
Distributed by Baker Street
Odd Lot Entertainment
Release date(s) September 9, 2005 (UK)
Running time 108 min.
Country USA / UK
Language English
IMDb profile
For the actual street, see Green Street (street).

Green Street is a 2005 drama film about football hooliganism in England. It was directed by Lexi Alexander and stars Elijah Wood and Charlie Hunnam. In the United States and Australia, the film is called Green Street Hooligans, while in the United Kingdom it has the title Green Street after initially being called Hooligans. In other countries, it is called Football Hooligans or just Hooligans. In the film, an American college student (Matt Buckner — played by Elijah Wood) falls in with a violent English football firm (the Green Street Elite) run by the brother of his brother-in-law and is morally transformed by their commitment to each other. The movie received an R rating from the MPAA for brutal violence, pervasive language and some drug use. The story and screenplay were developed by former hooligan turned author Dougie Brimson.

Contents

[edit] Synopsis

Matt Buckner (Elijah Wood) is kicked out of Harvard whilst on a journalism course after authorities discover cocaine in his room. The drugs actually belong to his preppy roommate Jeremy Van Holden (Terence Jay) but Buckner is afraid to speak up because the Van Holdens are a powerful family. He is given $10,000 for his trouble, and uses the money to travel to Britain with the intention of living with his sister (Claire Forlani), her husband Steve Dunham (Marc Warren) and his nephew.

Matt soon meets Steve's brother, Pete, a thuggish, loud Cockney seemingly in his early-to-mid 20s. Steve proposes that Pete takes Matt to see West Ham play at home to Birmingham. Pete is very reluctant in taking a "Yank" (English slang for an American) to a football match, giving the racist nature of Pete's friends and the other football fans. He is eventually persuaded into taking him, and Matt is told by Steve not to give Pete any of the money that he has just given to him.

On the way to the game, Pete tells that there is nothing less he would like to do than take a Yank to the game, so he proposes that Matt gives him half the money, and the other he can keep to himself to go round the pubs and clubs. Matt refuses, keeping his promise to Steve, resulting in Pete starting on him. Matt attempts to kick Pete in his genitals, which Pete reverses and sends him to the floor. Perhaps feeling pity for him, Pete doesn't continue fighting, instead taking Matt to the Abbey (the local pub for the GSE, West Ham's firm) and the game, in an attempt to teach him something about violence (the previous scuffle being Matt's first violent experience).

Matt meets Pete's friends in the Abbey, all eventually taking to him, except Bovver, who completely blanks him upon meeting him. After a few beers, they all walk to Upton Park to see the game. A fight is started with Birmingham's firm, which results in Matt getting jumped by three Birmingham fans, who nearly perform a gruesome torture act (By using a credit card to perform a 'Chelsea Grin' on him) upon him until the GSE intervene, which progresses to a bigger fight with the rest of Birmingham's firm. Though grossly outnumbered, the GSE defeat Birmingham, with Matt doing well in his first true fight and being inducted into the GSE.

It is later revealed that the GSE's sworn enemy is Millwall's firm, led by Tommy Hatcher. When Bovver begins to get sick of Matt being close with Pete, he starts negotiating with Hatcher. One of the firm sees Matt in The Times' headquarters with his father, who is a renowned journalist, and is taking Matt to lunch. He tells Bovver, who mistakingly presumes that Matt is a journalist himself. The English firms, and the GSE, hate jounalists for constantly focusing on and slamming their violent actions and causing it to overshadow football victories. Bovver confronts Pete about Matt's jounalism. Pete's brother Steve finds out and goes to the Abbey to warn Matt. It is then that Matt finds out that Steve used to be the "The Major," the leader of the GSE.

When Steve was The Major, the last game he went to was West Ham versus Millwall, to which Tommy Hatcher bought along his 12-year-old son. Tommy constantly boasted about how hard he'd bought him up to be. After the game, a fight broke out between the GSE and the Millwall firm. Tommy's son got badly caught up in the fight and was killed. Since then Tommy Hatcher "lost it," blaming the death of his son solely on the GSE, mainly Steve Dunham. After seeing Tommy's son die, Steve quit the GSE.

Bovver eventually arrives, and there is a big argument in the Abbey, which is eventually resolved, but Bovver still doesn't trust Matt. Infuriated, he goes to Millwall's local and asks Tommy Hatcher to come to the Abbey to sort stuff out. At first Hatcher is reluctant, until Bovver tells Hatcher that Steve Dunham is there.

The Millwall firm crash the Abbey, with Tommy Hatcher petrol bombing the bar and confronting Steve Dunham. Whilst Steve proclaims he's no longer part of the GSE and says he has a wife and son. Tommy gets even angrier, shouting that he "had a son once" and stabs Steve in the neck with a broken bottle, saying, "If you die tonight, we're even."

Whilst the fight is going on in the Abbey, Bovver is knocked out outside, after being smashed over the head with a glass bottle and being called a grass (slang for informer) by the Millwall firm. When he comes around, Steve Dunham is being carried out of the Abbey with blood flowing from his neck, which causes Bovver to be distraught and sends him into deep regret. Steve is taken to the hospital by Pete, Matt and Bovver, where Pete blasts Bovver for getting his brother in hospital and being a grass, saying that he trusted him the most and now despises him.

Previously, West Ham had been drawn to play Millwall in the FA Cup, which both sides were happy with as they could fight the other firm. But now with Steve being put in hospital, a post-match fight is ditched simply for a straight fight between the entire GSE and Millwall, near the Millennium Dome.

The end fight is perhaps one of the most memorable scenes in the film, as both sides go into a resolution brawl, in a gritty and brutal display. Bovver shows up, fighting for GSE to try and make up for what he has done. When helping up Pete, who has been badly hurt after being beaten with a cosh by Tommy Hatcher, Pete tells him that if he wants to make up for what he's done, he should get Matt's sister and nephew out of here, who have turned up unexpectedly and is attacked by one of Tommy's men to take revenge on Steve Dunham.

Tommy Hatcher goes to go to the car that Matt's sister is in, until Pete shouts to him, asking if he wants to "finish him off." After Tommy says he's already finished off, Pete says that it's not the GSE who killed his son, and puts the blame on Tommy for not protecting his son all those years ago. This seems to drive Tommy Hatcher fully insane, as he walks up to him shouting, headbutting him, knocking him out, then repeatedly punches him on the floor whilst he is still knocked out, eventually beating him to death, all the while insulting Pete. The fight completely halts at this point, and Tommy gets pulled off, still screaming, with everyone now surrounding Pete's dead body, with Bovver by his side.

Matt then drives with his sister to the airport, where he flies back to America. He confronts Jeremy Van Holden in a restaurant toilet where Jeremy is snorting cocaine. Previously promising to hook him up after Matt took the fall for him, Jeremy agrees again to do so but arrogantly tells Matt to leave. Matt then pulls out a tape recorder and plays back what Jeremy just said, saying that it is his "ticket back to Harvard." Jeremy tries to steal the tape off him, but Matt easily reverses his attack and holds his fist up, as if to punch Jeremy, who is now a quivering wreck. Matt doesn't punch Jeremy, but instead walks out with a deserved smug smile as Jeremy collapses to the floor, defeated.

The film ends with Matt walking down an American street outside the restaurant singing West Ham's song, "I'm Forever Blowing Bubbles."

[edit] Cultural context

The name of the firm in film, the Green Street Elite, refers to Green Street in the London Borough of Newham, where West Ham's home stadium, Boleyn Ground (more commonly known as Upton Park) is located. West Ham is supported by one of England's notorious hooligan firms: the Inter City Firm (ICF). [1] Although Green Street has received some criticism regarding the exaggerated level of violence shown between the firms in the movie, the cultural validity of the script is rooted in anthropological studies of firm behaviorism. [2] [3]

[edit] Cast

Actor Role
Elijah Wood Matt Buckner
Charlie Hunnam Pete Dunham
Leo Gregory Bovver
Claire Forlani Shannon Buckner Dunham
Marc Warren Steve Dunham
Ross McCall Dave
Rafe Spall Swill
Kieran Bew Ike
Geoff Bell Tommy Hatcher
Oliver Allison Ben Dunham
James Allison Ben Dunham
Terence Jay Jeremy Van Holden
Scott Christie Millwall Lad/Ricky
Joel Beckett Terry
Tom Vloothuis Firm Member

[edit] Reviews of film

  • New York Post: "Director and co-writer Lexi Alexander choreographs the fight scenes with thrilling chaos, and the plot unfolds expertly if melodramatically. "
  • The New York Times: "The truth is that once you have seen one glass bottle shatter over a guy's head, you have pretty much seen them all. When toward the end of the film Ms. Alexander shows the hooligans at their day jobs - behind desks, in ties and suits - these shards of normalcy register as both surprising and disappointing"
  • Total Film: "Elijah Wood struggles as a Jekyll and Hyde hooligan, but this is a skull-cracking glimpse at a dangerous and addictive underworld."
  • Empire: "A surprisingly rose-tinted look at a subculture that really should have been stamped out some time ago"
  • Rotten Tomates: "When it comes to the subculture of soccer thugs, Green Street Hooligans lacks sufficient insight, and instead comes off as a Fight Club knock-off."
  • Nuts Magazine: "Makes The Football Factory look like a girly playground scrap"
  • The Daily Mirror (U.K): "The plot's not much cop"
  • Worldwide Total Gross: $3,154,346 United States Total Gross: $346,830

[edit] Trivia

 Trivia sections are discouraged under Wikipedia guidelines.
The article could be improved by integrating relevant items and removing inappropriate ones.
  • The West Ham firm in the film is called the Green Street Elite also known as Hooligans (GSE). The real-life West Ham firm is called the Inter City Firm (ICF), so called because of the firms use of the Inter City trains to travel to away matches.
  • The South London Press reported that (then Millwall manager) Dennis Wise, heavily fined and suspended two of his players for attending the film's premiere.
  • Terence Jay, who played Matt Buckner's (Elijah Wood) roommate, also wrote and performed several of the film's soundtracks. He is also the producer Deborah de Prete's son.
  • The first game in the film showed West Ham at home to Birmingham City. The action on the pitch, however, was filmed at a game between West Ham and Gillingham.
  • Macclesfield Train Station shown in the film was actually Westbury Train Station of Wiltshire.
  • The song heard as they descend the steps after the Manchester brawl is "I wanna be adored" by the famous Manchester group, The Stone Roses. "Waterfall" is also heard in the film, as is "Lions", a song from Ian Brown (lead singer of The Stone Roses)'s solo album Unfinished Monkey Business.
  • The film used a working title of The Yank in the United States of America until it was titled "Green Street Hooligans" there.
  • The pub where many scenes are filmed is actually 'The Griffin' in Brentford, West London - on the other side of the city from Upton Park in East London. The pub is one of the four pubs that are at each corner of Brentford FC's Griffin Park stadium. The scene where Tommy Hatcher's son is killed is filmed behind the Bill Axbey (New Road) stand of the stadium.
  • After the Birmingham game, Pete tells Matt not to go home via West Ham Station (so as to avoid any trouble), it is implied by this that West Ham Station is the nearest to the stadium. However Upton Park tube station is in fact much nearer.

[edit] Awards

LA Femme Film Festival

  • Lexi Alexander won Best Feature (2005)

Malibu Film Festival

  • Lexi Alexander won Best of the Fest (2005)

SXSW Film Festival

  • Lexi Alexander won Special Jury Award

[edit] Soundtrack

  • "Shame"
    • Written and Performed by Terence Jay
    • With Balazs Szalai, Daesik Kim, Ricky J. Hernandez=
  • "Run from the Pigs"
    • Written and Performed by Terence Jay
    • With Balazs Szalai, Daesik Kim, Ricky J. Hernandez
  • "Only When I Laugh"
    • Written by Ken Jones
  • "Hooligan Drums"
    • Written and Performed by Ivan Koutikov
  • "Stuntman"
  • "The Strength of One"
    • Music by Machine Head
    • Performed by Christopher Mann
  • "A No Win Situation"
    • Music by Machine Head
    • Performed by Christopher Mann
  • "Queen's English"
    • Written by Peter Batchelder, Daniel Holter and Vinny Millevolte
    • Courtesy of FirstCom Music, a unit of Zomba Enterprises, Inc.
  • "Waterfall"
    • Written by Ian Brown (as Ian George Brown) and John Squire
    • Performed by Stone Roses
    • Courtesy of Jive Records under license from BMG Film & TV Music
  • "I Wanna Be Adored"
    • Written by Ian Brown (as Ian George Brown) and John Squire
    • Performed by Stone Roses
    • Courtesy of Jive Records under license from BMG Film & TV Music
  • "I'm Forever Blowing Bubbles"
    • Written by Jaan Kenbrovin and John Kellette
  • "Def Beat"
    • Written by Tom Holkenborg
    • Performed by Junkie XL
    • Courtesy of Roadrunner Records
  • "Seasick"
    • Written by Willie Scott
    • Courtesy of FirstCom Music, a unit of Zomba Enterprises, Inc.
  • "One Kick Beyond"
    • Written and Produced by Junkie XL
  • "Stand Your Ground"
    • Written by Brett L. Gordon and Alexander Lusty
    • Performed by Acarine
    • Courtesy of CNR Records
  • "Morning Song"
    • Written and Produced by Junkie XL
  • "One Blood"
    • Written by Charlie Midnight and Ivan Koutikov
    • Performed by Terence Jay
  • "Test of a Man"
    • Written and Performed by Dash
  • "Moving On"
    • Written by Reuben Alexander, David Ireland and Kai Lemke
    • Performed by Must
    • Courtesy of Wind-Up Records, LLC

[edit] References

  1. ^ The Independant
  2. ^ Newham Recorder
  3. ^ Newham Recorder

[edit] External links