Attack the Block

The small, independent, low-budget science fiction-horror British film opened in the United States on August 11 when riots and unrest broke out in the United Kingdom. That police were unprepared for the turmoil and violence was all over the news.



Luckily for London cops “Attack the Block” opened in the UK in May, because the film, that won an award for Best Narrative at the Los Angeles Film Festival this year, is of the opinion that London police are pretty useless. This is evidenced when aliens attack and the police haven’t a clue what to do.


A group of thugs is led by Moses, played by a very impressive newcomer, John Boyega who reminded me of a young Denzel Washington in look and gravitas. The mug a young nurse who has just graduated, Sam (Jodie Whittaker), without realizing she has a flat in their “block” of subsidized public apartments; she’s one of them. As she runs off, a thing falls from the sky. Moses kills it, then impales it on a stick and takes it to a gang leader who grows marijuana in a sealed room in his flat.


Meanwhile, Sam calls the cops. She identifies Moses and the cops arrest him. But the skinless “thing” is not alone. Its companions, black furry things with sharp luminous green teeth, want it back. They attack the police van and the action begins.

 

I liked this urban social commentary that seems framed by the Exodus story. For those of you who remember the Hammer horror flicks, this may even seem a little retro. At first, Moses leads his young gang, mostly likable characters, to take what they think is owed them by society. When other gangs get involved, and people get hurt, including Moses, he steps up to lead the entire population of the block to freedom. But from what?

 

The aliens lost one of their own, perhaps it was an “infant”, and they only want back what belongs to them – much like the human rights and respect that Moses and his gang, social aliens, are seeking in all the wrong ways.  They need a leader who can show them alternatives.

 

I didn’t see any advertisements for “Attack the Block”, no marketing at all. It just happened to be the one film at the local multiplex that was new and that I had not yet seen. I was the only one in the theater as well. That’s too bad, because this film is one of the good ones: entertaining, a little scary, good acting and directing, thoughtful about human freedom and dignity, and just a little cheesy in the alien department.


There’s a hero in everyone.