The Rise And Fall Of A White Collar Hooligan

England. A country known for many things. The Beatles, tea drinking, and most of all, football. One of the biggest problems in England are the football hooligans. Every year, thousand are being arrested, some people are injured so bad they need medical care. It´s tragic. You would think going to a football game means spending time with friends and family, and just enjoy a game of football, but reality is hooligans make this too personal. Movie adaptions of football hooligans have been made several times, the best one that comes to mind is The Football Factory from 2004. Brutal, and honest film making, on a very high quality level, telling the story of how football hooligans live and think.The Rise And Fall Of A White Collar Hooligan takes a look at football hooligans, but in a different way. Is this new british crime drama worth your attention, or just something we have seen many times before ?

Mike Jakobs ( Nick Nevern ) is unemployed, and is desperate to get a job. With no luck at job interviews, his criminal friend Eddie ( Simon Phillips ) suggest he begins working as a driver for his business, delivering packages around London. Everything is going smooth, as Eddie introduce Mike to another job, taking out money with fake bank cards, with other peoples money transfered into their own accounts. Mike is skeptic at first, but realise he can live life now. Football games, hooligan fights, party with girls, drugs and alcohol become a daily need. But his girlfriend Katie ( Rita Ramnani ) have had enough, and leave him. At a trip to France with Eddie and his friends, things go terribly wrong, and Mike is arrested. Will he finally stop this life of hell ?

If you expect to see a lot of football, you might be disappointed. Then again, this is a good choice if you love british cinema, the acting is really good. One of the few problems i have with this movie, is that it´s too short, only about 1 hour and 20 minutes, i would have like to know more about Mike´s childhood, what made him become a criminal. Apart from this, we get an intense criminal drama that makes you think, is it really worth all that money, when you get nothing in the end but misery ? Worth to rent, and might even be a good education movie at school for teenagers, to see what can happen to anyone, if you end up in the wrong friendship.

Rating: DDD