christopher-underwood I was drawn to watching this again, partly because it was shot just before the whole Thames and Docklands redevelopment began, I'd recently rewatched Helen Mirren in Greenaway's, The Cook, the Thief, His Wife and her Lover and I had a Blu ray disc. The big surprise was how much I enjoyed the film. I don't remember holding it in much affection but was very impressed, not only with the shots of now disappeared dockland areas, but the way the film unfolds with much tension and constant surprises. The inclusion of references to the IRA ensure that this is not to be some ordinary London gangland film from the start and subsequent explosions keep this from being some petty tale of in fighting. Helen Mirren is exceptional here and very much helps to hold things together. There are some actors here who need steadying and she certainly seems to have great influence, even with Bob Hoskins, who can seem rather flat or alternatively over the top. Here he seems to take his cue from Mirren and gives one of his very best performances - till the very end, don't miss it! As in the Greenaway film, she again plays the gangster's moll although a good deal less trodden down in this one. Well worth watching, this keeps moving with great dialogue and visuals.

Michael J Salmestrelli (vonnoosh) British gangster movies can be a little predictable. What keeps them alive is how well the lead is and how interesting the plot unfolds. This film accomplishes both excellently. This is one of the rare movies where you learn what's the major issue along with the main character and this is a good 45 minutes into it at least.The film opens with a lengthy sequence of scenes strung together by Francis Monkman's excellent score. While no one is speaking, you are following things because they are moving quickly. These events are not explained to us though. We simply see them. I won't describe them except to say, it's this sequence that the viewer learns the meaning of along with Bob Hoskins' Harold Shand who is introduced immediately following it.Shand arrives home from an undisclosed location but you can assume it wherever he was, it was a major success for him and his organization. He has plans to expand his organization but he needs further financial assistance by American gangsters who he meets on Good Friday. Without knowing anything about what's happening, people in his employ are being brutally murdered. He launches an investigation and needless to say, things are a surprise to him.What makes this film interesting is Bob Hoskins' portrayal of Harold Shand. You learn all about the type of man he is, the type of character he always had and most importantly, how he got to be as powerful as he became. You learn the value of Helen Mirren's Victoria (Shand's wife). If nothing else, she stabilizes his inner reactionary rage. I imagine Shand fell back on her channeling him more than a few times in order to get to where he is in the story.The story is somewhat dated but it's dated like the movie War Games was. The then news headlines played a heavy role in the events in the story. In War Games it was the panic of an all out nuclear war between the US and USSR many were assuming was inevitable in the early 80's. In The Long Good Friday, it was something else entirely but no less important to what the landscape of London looked like in the late 70's and early 80's A young Pierce Brosnan has a dialog free role but no less important to the story. Paul Freeman also has no spoken word role in the story but he also is vital to how the story unfolds.On the whole, this is a movie that comes off as an experiment that really works well. All of the aspects of a good crime/action movie are here but they are presented in a different way, with a different story and with explosive, at times highly disturbing results. Truly worth seeing.

seymourblack-1 "The Long Good Friday" is a terrific gangster film, a fascinating character study and the movie that propelled Bob Hoskins into the big time. Its story about the downfall of a crime boss and the collapse of his empire is fast-moving, violent and tense and presents a sequence of events that seem totally unstoppable. The crime boss' inability to understand what's going on or to produce any kind of effective answer to the forces that threaten him, illustrate that he's a man whose time has passed and the solutions that he's always relied on simply don't work anymore.In the late 1970s, Harold Shand (Bob Hoskins) is the top gangster who's proud that his ability to negotiate with other criminals in London has brought an unprecedented 10 years of peace to the capital. During this period, he's become wealthy and enjoys living in a posh penthouse and spending time on his luxurious yacht. With corrupt police officers and council officials on his payroll, he feels his position is unassailable but is still ambitious to achieve more. He wants to assume the appearance of being a legitimate businessman and with the help of money supplied by the American mafia, plans a major redevelopment of London's docklands. This exciting project has the potential to make him even richer but he also says that his motivation is to elevate the status of London within Europe.Harold and his mistress, Victoria (Helen Mirren), welcome a mafia boss called Charlie (Eddie Constantine) and a mob lawyer called Tony (Stephen Davies) to a reception on their yacht in the hope that they can persuade them to invest heavily in the proposed docklands project but during their visit, a series of killings and bombings result in the deaths of Harold's chauffeur and his right-hand-man, Colin (Paul Freeman). His Rolls Royce is destroyed by a bomb during an attempt on his mother's life, a pub he owns is extensively damaged by another bomb and a third undetonated bomb is discovered in his casino.Harold mobilises all the resources at his disposal and uses extreme violence and torture to try to find whoever's responsible for the attacks but is spectacularly unsuccessful in his search and also in concealing the seriousness of what's happening from his mafia guests. By the time he eventually understands who his enemies are and the reasons for their attacks, it's too late to save his empire.Bob Hoskins is astonishingly good at portraying his character's range of emotions and behaviours as he's convincingly vicious, cruel and sadistic on some occasions and then vulnerable, confused and pathetic on others. Harold is a deluded man who believes that he can achieve respectability and remain a violent thug at the same time and his poor judgement also leads him to underestimate both his enemies and his mafia guests. Hoskins achieves something significant by making Harold's actions seem understandable and in the final sequence of the movie, the range of thoughts and feelings he shows in a short period of reflection are also extremely powerful. Helen Mirren is classy as Victoria and a strong supporting cast add considerable colour and realism to this tough and very memorable crime drama.

JoshuaDysart 'The Long Good Friday' is a perfectly dated late 70's/early 80's British Gangster flick staring Bob Hoskins and Helen Mirren. Completed in 1979, but not released until 1980 (by George Harrison's company, no less), the film acts as a sort of bridge between the established violent grit cinema of the '70's and the coming slick synth aesthetic of the 80's.The movie is, mostly, perfectly balanced between classy, character driven, and wonderfully exploitive. When that balance does tip too far towards filmic excess it can sometimes take a good thing right up to the edge of self-parody. But ultimately this only serves to solidify the film's courage and amp up its spirit. Somehow the movie manages to become cooler in its few missteps than it would've been had it achieved perfection.A huge part of its elevation from "mildly inspiring" to "stupid awesome" are the performances at the heart of it. Bob Hoskins is virile, dangerous and genuinely alive. Helen Mirren is smart, collected and stunning. Their scenes together soar with such intense realism that they pull the more mundane thriller aspects of the piece up along with it. The two great actors are a rising tide for the whole endeavor.And to top it all off, the film now comes off as pretty prophetic regarding the gentrification of London and the arrival of the UK's role in New Europe, even as the UK struggled with their own militant troubles at home. This theme is perfectly capped when Hoskin's delivers a "Network"- style visionary speech about England emerging from the post-war dregs into the heightened capitalistic fervor of a new era at the end of the film. Along with the very last shot, it's a legendary piece of cinema.If the camera-work is sometimes pedestrian (it is) it's certainly saved by Francis Monkman's ridiculously cool, driving electronic jazz/funk score. The music screams - sometimes too loud - over the images, often drowning out all other sound until you're left with just the gleam of pure, stylish cinema, the kind that Michael Mann would soon after turn into the very look and feel of the '80's with 'Thief'.And if that's not enough to sell you on this great, great flick, it also features a baby-faced Pierce Brosnan in his first film role as a virtually mute hit-man.Such a good time.