Film

Dead Man Running

Cert: 15

Description: Nick Kane is dangerously behind with debt repayments to notorious gangster and loan shark Thigo. With the credit crunch biting hard, Thigo decides to make an example out of Nick and he holds the former convict's mother hostage. In order to save her, Nick must raise ¿100,000 in 24 hours. So Nick joins forces with best mate Bing to find the cash, travelling to the outskirts of Manchester and the dog tracks of east London.

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Dir: Alex De Rakoff.

Cast: Monet Mazur, Tamer Hassan, Brenda Blethyn, Curtis ¿50 Cent¿ Jackson, Danny Dyer

Country: UK.

Year: 2009.

Duration: 91mins

Dead Man Running is entertaining enough

Dead Man Running never seems to know whether it's comedy or comment

By Derek Malcolm
30 Oct 2009

If you think Rio Ferdinand’s form on the football field has suffered lately, it could be that he has been fretting about this cockney crime caper, which he produced with Ashley Cole.

Tamer Hassan plays a crook just out of jail who is trying to go straight to please his mum (Brenda Blethyn). Unfortunately, the recession does for his business and the £100,000 he has burrowed from loan shark Mr Thigo (Curtis Jackson, aka 50 Cent) has to be paid back in 24 hours. Or else.

Though competently directed by Alex De Rakoff, Dead Man Running sadly never seems to know whether it’s a comedy or a comment on tough London times.

But it’s exuberantly played and entertaining enough if you ignore the lack of logic.