What the Dickens?
TWIST Cert 12
According to the publicity bumf, this Sky original movie brings Charles Dickens’ Oliver Twist “thrillingly up-to-date”. That’s not necessarily an awful idea. But if you’re imagining improvised dialogue, open casting for authentic amateurs, and meticulous research into 21st-century child poverty, consider yourself way off the mark.
Instead, it seems director Martin Owen and his six screenwriters watched a few old Guy Ritchie movies, thumbed through a Noughties indie compilation and swapped buzzwords about youth culture, coming up with these: Banksy, Parkour, Rita Ora, Game of Thrones, Noel Clarke, Keith Lemon, The Vaccines. Owen’s last movie was the equally dire Killers Anonymous, a rip-off of early Tarantino that came out in 2019. His finger, it seems, is not exactly on the pulse.
Here, Oliver, played by Rafferty Law (son of Jude) is a free-running graffiti artist who somersaults across modern London rooftops.
Overacting chart topper Rita Ora is the gender-flipped “Dodge” who leads him astray. Meanwhile, Sikes is an angry lesbian played by Lena Headey, and Noel Clarke is a bored-looking cop.
As Law explains in an opening voiceover, there will be “no singing and no dancing”. Which is a shame as I’d have killed to see Michael Caine performing I’d Do Anything. In this context, it would work beautifully as a sly commentary on his half-hearted turn as con artist Fagin. Look closely and you can see him mentally cashing his pay cheque.
The plot barely makes sense, the dialogue is atrocious, the action scenes are like Lock, Stock And Two Smoking Barrels parodies – and there’s an extended cameo for Keith Lemon.
The last time Caine did Dickens, he was Scrooge to Kermit the Frog’s Bob Cratchit. This time, the muppets are behind the camera.
The plot of Twist barely makes sense and the dialogue is atrocious