A string of hit records, a successful TV career, two decent movies under his belt, a couple of years married to Mariella Frostrup - he's done well for himself, Richard Jobson. Having made the transition from critic to filmmaker with relative ease (16 Years Of Alcohol is deserving of everybody's time), it seemed we might be in for a string of diverting movies from the renaissance man. Alas, after New Town Killers, Jobson would be fortunate were Sky to give him his old job back.
A reinvention of 1932 fantasy-thriller The Most Dangerous Game that owes more to a previous shoddy remake - Surviving The Game - than the 1930s classic, New Town Killers stars would-be Wolverine Dougray Scott as Alistair, a banker who when he isn't fleecing his clients likes nothing more than chasing local youths around council estates. If the kids elude him, Alex and fellow urban hunter Jamie (Alastair Mackenzie) agree to pay them £12,000. But these bankers are out for blood, and when their latest victim Sean (James Anthony Pearson) seems smarter than the average hobo, well, that just makes the game even more exciting.
Last seen bombing badly as Bernard Sumner in the Joy Division movie Control, James Anthony Pearson is far worse here, his lack of personality and charisma making him that rarest of things - a victim it's hard to give a damn about. That said, when a hero's as dull as this, even an actor as limited as Dougray Scott can't help but appear charismatic so perhaps his presence serves some purpose.
The problems with the cast are as nothing compared to the behind-the-camera deficiencies, however. Say what you like about big ballsy action directors like Tony Scott or Michael Bay but at least they are expert in their - rather ridiculous - field. Richard Jobson, by contrast, has here made a film featuring free-running that makes this most bizarre of extreme pursuits appear positively pedestrian. The director also comes a cropper on the photography front, the desire to make an action movie within a Mike Leigh-like milieu resulting in a picture so dreary it leaves Ken Loach looking like Joel Schumacher.
To be fair, writer-director Jobson doesn't want for ambition. Having made a film like 16 Years Of Alcohol, it would have been easy to keep ploughing the same furrow. But while mating genres might be intellectually interesting, you can look both stupid and naïve if you don't pull it off. And speaking of naïve stupidity, there's also nothing particularly clever about calling your lead character Raskolnikov
Oof! Never seen that and now I may never will! I do like Jobbo, though. He's a talented bloke.