Caper drowns in plot and characters

Rocknrolla (MA15+) 2½ stars National release AT the time of its release in 1998, Guy Ritchie's first feature, Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, became the third biggest grossing British film of all time, quite an achievement for a young film buff who dropped out of school at 15 and who never had any formal training in film writing or directing.

Ludacris, left, and Jeremy Piven in a scene from Guy Ritchie's latest offering, Rocknrolla

Rocknrolla (MA15+) 2½ stars National release AT the time of its release in 1998, Guy Ritchie's first feature, Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, became the third biggest grossing British film of all time, quite an achievement for a young film buff who dropped out of school at 15 and who never had any formal training in film writing or directing.

Instead he learned his craft on the job, working as a runner on Wardour Street before making a short film, The Hard Case (1995), which became his calling card. But as with many film directors, including Orson Welles, initial success doesn't always result in a successful career. Ritchie's second feature, Snatch (2000) was passable, but his collaboration with his wife, Madonna, on Swept Away (2002), a remake of a Lina Wertmuller film, was a disaster and Revolver (2005) sank almost without trace. Rocknrolla has been widely seen as Ritchie's comeback, a return to the convoluted cockney capers of his first feature. But although all the ingredients are in place, it seems as though the director has lost his touch.

At first glance, Rocknrolla seems promising. It has an interesting cast, some intriguing plot developments and a very sleek look. Why is it, in the end, such a mess? Perhaps because Ritchie has tried to pack too much in: the film suffers from an excess of characters and a plot so convoluted that it sinks under its own weight.

Lenny Cole (Tom Wilkinson) is London's crime kingpin; he has a formidable organisation, overseen by his fiercely loyal and ruthless lieutenant, Archie (Mark Strong), he has crooked politicians on his books and a sure sense of his own importance and invincibility. His achilles heel is his stepson, Johnny Quid (Toby Kebbell), a junkie rock star whose unstable lifestyle teeters on the brink of disaster.

Much further down the pecking order of London crims is One Two (Gerard Butler) who, with his partner, Mumbles (Idris Elba), has attempted a bit of property speculation that entailed borrowing a heap of money from Cole.

Cole has double-crossed One Two, but of course still wants his money back. Meanwhile Cole has sealed a E7 million deal with Russian criminal Uri (Karel Roden); through his corrupt contacts with local politicians, Cole has been able to secure planning approval for a huge property development in which Uri is involved.

But Uri's accountant, in the fetching but rather unlikely figure of Stella (Thandie Newton), tells One Two about the E7 million, which Uri is paying to Cole in cash, and One Two and Mumbles succeed in stealing the loot. Uri is forced to find another E7million, but with Stella still in the frame, its security is no more certain than before. And so it goes on, with plenty of added complications and an excess of colourful characters, including Handsome Bob (Tom Hardy), a secretly gay gangster, and Mickey (Jeremy Piven) and Roman (Chris "Ludacris" Bridges), Johnny Quid's managers.

On a superficial level all this is smartly put together. It certainly looks good (photography by David Higgs), and for a while you go along for the ride. But as the film progresses it becomes increasingly unwieldy. A pretentious gimmick, involving Uri's lucky painting, which gets passed from hand to hand during the course of the film, proves to be a particularly annoying and contrived MacGuffin, Alfred Hitchcock's term for a plot device to advance the story.

Despite the untidy, cluttered nature of the film some of the actors emerge with credit. Wilkinson's ageing crime boss (a character rather similar to the one Bob Hoskins played in The Long Good Friday in 1979) impresses, and Butler brings a welcome charisma to the lowlife One Two. Most impressive, though, is Strong as Cole's implacable deputy. This actor, who made a considerable impression as the Jordanian security chief in the film Body of Lies, brings conviction to what could have been a nothing part; the film ends with the suggestion that there may be a sequel featuring Archie as the main character and, while it's doubtful that Rocknrolla will be successful enough to merit a further episode, it's an intriguing idea. Meanwhile Strong is acting in Ritchie's next film, Sherlock Holmes, though not as the famous detective, a part for which he might have been well suited.