Movie: Sumotherhood
Production Companies: Piece of Pie Productions, Deaconstructed, Belstone Pictures
Director: Adam Deacon
Producers: Adam Deacon, Jazzie Zonzolo, Finn Bruce
Scriptwriters: Adam Deacon, Jazzie Zonzolo, Michael Vu
Main Cast: Adam Decon, Jazzie Zonzolo
Release Date: 13th October 2023
Running Time: 97 minutes
Certificate: 15
Introduction: The sequel to the 2011 spoof gangster film is light on the laughs and instead heavy on the cringe.
Synopsis: After attempting to rob a famous rapper in an underground club, the characters of Riko and Kane (played by Adam Deacon – ‘Rico’ – and Jazzie Zonzolo – Kane) , seen previously in the film ‘Anuvahood’, try and desperately prove that they are real gangsters only to get themselves in trouble with various different crimelords amid a night of chaos.
Analysis: It must be said I am entirely unaware of Adam Deacon and his body of work. His directing and writing credits only include ‘Anuvahood’ and ‘Sumotherhood’ but his acting filmography is far more accomplished with 70 titles to his name, all British films. I have to say unfortunately, that I found this only just about tolerable. It is a sequel that might put you off the original though I must say I have yet to see that either. The performances across the board are very annoying, some very vibrant and animated characters are very hard work to watch. They reduce their performance down to nothing but shrieks and are only slightly bordering on being humorous.
That is not to say that the laughs in the film are entirely non – existent, some are chuckle worthy but nothing even remotely approaching laugh out loud humour. Far, far more superior comedies have come out this year; most notably ‘Joy Ride’. This is not even as remotely as funny. In a bizarre sense, this seemed to me to be a very rough culmination of ‘People Just Do Nothing’ mixed (every so slightly) with Chris Morris’s ‘Four Lions’- in the sense that the two characters here try to be something they are so clearly not. Whilst not as promising as that premise sounds, elements of those two films and their plots can be seen to be fairly recurrent here or at least share the same ideas.
As you may have seen on the poster or in the trailer, there are two cameos in the film which consist of *deep breath* Jeremy Corbyn and Ed Sheeran. Heaven only knows how they got Corbyn to do this or how they even got him to say this dialogue – he actually says out loud ‘allow it, waste man’ and then makes an obligatory joke about the Tories. His performance and line delivery is of course so wooden, like we expected anything more. Now, the other consists of Ed Sheeran playing a homeless person. His role is certainly far more outgoing that his counterpart and the two are certainly playing a game of who can be more embarrassing, Sheeran wins this one I think.
A couple of set pieces are quite well done and funny – one of which takes place in a bank as Riko and Kane attempt (unsuccessfully) to rob it, and one at the end which essentially plays out like a Mexican standoff – both get a fairly equal and fair amount of laughs. In the end, I sadly don’t see this leaving much of an impact at all as it only just scraped by on a few chuckles.
Overall Rating: 2.5/10 – Bad
Target Audience: 15+
Content Warning: strong Language, drug misuse, violence, sex references, discrimination
Recommendation: No
