The Gentlemen review: Guy Ritchie spinoff is a banger

The Gentlemen is an ultra-Guy Ritchie experience; a brilliant, binge-able sojourn into a frying-pan-or-fire world of drugs, violence, and struggles and grunts.

Ritchie has a Neopolitan filmography: there’s the Cockney gangster bangers, like Snatch and Lock Stock; in the middle, there’s a swathe of brawny, often underrated movies, like The Man from U.N.C.L.E. and Wrath of Man; and then there’s box office polar opposites Aladdin and King Arthur, flavored with a heap of “what the f**k?” sprinkles.

In 2019, he directed The Gentlemen, a supremely naughty, nasty, and invigorating return to his most confident realm that had mega-watt movie star turns from Matthew McConaughey and Hugh Grant. Its world, governed by hilarious verbal gymnastics and pound-of-flesh punishments, cried out for more; it was a dangerous hope, given we’d already been teased for nothing with The Real RocknRolla.

His Netflix spinoff is a Ritchie-rich feast, but it’s not just an exercise in potty-mouthed frivolity and showmanship for the punters: this is a testament to a storyteller’s evolution.

The Gentlemen is not a sequel

The series borders on reboot territory; its connections to the film are sparer than sparing, even when it edges you with boxing gyms, car dealerships, and mystery mischief-makers. Mickey Pearson, the Coach and co. are nowhere to be seen, nor are they mentioned; your expectations are better tempered.

Instead, we enter the orbit of Eddie Horniman (Theo James, in his best role to date), an “aristocratic soldier” with the Queen’s Dragoon Guards who’s called home to the deathbed of his father, the Duke of Halstead. Spoiler (not really): he dies, and in a shock move sends his vape-clutching, disaster-of-a-human brother Freddy (Daniel Ings) apoplectic, the estate leap-frogs the expected path of succession straight to him.

The debt and dukedom aren’t all he inherits: the manor happens to be sitting atop one cog of the UK’s biggest marijuana empire. Bobby Glass (Ray Winstone, on superbly restrained form) may be its head honcho, but as he’s locked up (a generous turn of phrase given his lax imprisonment), it’s managed by his formidable daughter Susie (Kaya Scodelario).

This places him firmly on a never-ending runway of criminal shenanigans and run-ins with some pretty odd and unsavory folks, whether it’s Giancarlo Esposito’s toff-obsessed Yank (sublime casting), the traveling community (a great nod to Snatch, even if there’s no “dags”), “God-drunk, luna-c**ts” from whom unhinged judgment cometh, fight promoters, and machete-wielding drug lords – to sample a few. Eddie’s endgame is an exit – but then again, how does one achieve their goal? Non sine periculo.

The Gentlemen has an unlikely MVP

Netflix

It’s a strong ensemble, with Ings delivering a turn that begins as profoundly loathsome, before finding crumbs of pathos. His brotherly chemistry with James is particularly authentic; there’s an obligatory dependence, love, and constant rift of resentment there that they quickly convey.

The show simply doesn’t work without Scodelario; there may be some borrowed mannerisms from Michelle Dockery’s Rosalind, but she also has the slow-bubbling, concealed ferocity of a Kray brother, and depth (and agency, for better or worse) that we’ve not really seen from a female lead in the director’s films. That’s before we get to the carefully calibrated, crackling tension between her and James; there’s no two ways about it, they’re incredibly attractive and talented people, and watching them spar, flank each other, and tiptoe towards… something is delectable.

There’s features a Ritchie veteran: Vinnie Jones, and it wouldn’t be an overstatement to call it one of his best, most sensitive performances to date (I know). He plays the manor’s groundskeeper Geoff, a go-to voice of sage advice even as sh*tstorms swirl around him. There’s a considered, comforting charm to every line he delivers; there’s still brass-b*llock confidence, but not arrogance (in one scene, as some unwanted visitors arrive at the estate, he tells Eddie with the smallest, wriest smile: “I am employed to kill vermin, Your Grace.”).

The cast all shine across the eight episodes, each one just as enjoyable as the last. There was a concern Ritchie’s style could be off-puttingly indulgent in the long-form format, but there’s no flotsam and jetsam; excluding one side mission with an extraordinary punchline, the main narrative’s pace rarely dips, nor does it disappoint. The broad comic strokes sometimes don’t land, with an appearance from Guz Khan feeling too skit-ish and absurd, but Ritchie’s laugh-out-loud Snatchian parlance is exercised extensively to great effect.

As a work of sartorial expression, The Gentlemen is an embarrassment of dying-to-be-worn riches; Scodelario’s fits are especially fierce. It can be visually dynamic when color conspires to overwhelm Britain’s looming grey, with Ritchie playing with composition and editing as he’s wont to do, and it also employs nifty, amusing bursts of explanatory text. But its barebones intro is a bit disappointing, given it’s just a chopped copy of the movie’s smoking credits sequence.

It most certainly isn’t the peak of his career – please, please make another London gangster movie for cinemas – but he does impressively wield the keys to another medium. Be it Season 2 or a big-screen sequel, we’ll have what he’s having.

The Gentlemen review score: 4/5

Much like its movie predecessor, The Gentlemen is a sweary, giddy dose of Guy Ritchie goodness. To borrow Fletcher’s words, it’s beautiful, beautiful… TV.

The Gentlemen starts streaming on Netflix on March 7.