28. The Kitchen; movie review

 

THE KITCHEN

Cert 15

107 mins

BBFC advice: Contains strong language

"Oh, no, I can't watch this - I have promised to see it with hubby because of the guy from Top Boy."

We were going to catch up with The Kitchen on Netflix while our granddaughter had her afternoon nap, but her mum pulled the plug because Kano had appeared in one of her and her fella's favourite series.

They were hyped for Wyatt Garfield's film about dystopian London.

Mrs W and I took it in after she and the baby departed, but we were disappointed.

However, the positive element which will stick with us is the performance of former England footballer Ian Wright.

Wright plays Lord Kitchener, the head of the pirate radio station in a high-rise ghetto where hundreds of poor, mainly black people are living.

Daily, he encourages them to stand tall against the establishment that sends in brutal police to evict them from the former social housing, flat by flat.

Kano's Izi is one of the residents of The Kitchen but is following his own path to freedom by building up enough money to afford an apartment in a new prestige block.

He keeps his head down, working at a funeral parlour where the deceased's ashes are exchanged for saplings in their honour.

However, his hopes of anonymity are shattered when he hears an epitaph of a young woman he knew and sees the sole attendee - a teenage boy (Jedaiah Bannerman).

The pair are initially wary of each other but gradually develop the trust needed to help them survive in a violent society.

The Kitchen is a tale of state oppression of the have-nots and suggests that those who have the most significant struggle are likely to be from ethnic minorities.

It impresses with the way it creates tension and a claustrophobic society but Mrs W and I were irritated by the speed at which it moved from scene to scene and its staccato dialogue.

This meant that we didn't understand the motivation and history of the characters as much as we might have liked.

For example, Wright's Lord Kitchener is so one-dimensional that I couldn't judge whether he could make further strides as an actor.

So, while we accepted that The Kitchen was gritty and provoked some thought, the storyline gaps were too wide for us to be as engaged as much as we wanted or expected.

Reasons to watch: Gritty

Reasons to avoid: Too many storyline gaps

Laughs: One

Jumps: None

Vomit: None

Nudity: None

Overall rating: 5.5/10

Did you know? In 2022,  Ian Wright launched a campaign with Cadbury and The Prince’s Trust to help young adults nationwide overcome their doubts, after research revealed three quarters (74%) of people experience doubts daily, 25% are lacking in self-confidence.

The final word. Kano: "Usually, when you make a film about an attack, it becomes a film about the attacker, as opposed to the people under attack. What we wanted to explore was those people’s identity and [sense of] community in spite of the attacks." The Guardian

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