MikePadgett.com

Snatch

— Ritchie's stylish talent for quotable, punchy London screenplays still has mileage, so why reinvent the wheel?…”

• Director: Guy Ritchie
• United Kingdom, 2000
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After Lock, Stock And Two Smoking Barrels sold so well and Snatch showed that the grotty London gangster motif had mileage, Ritchie’s career seemed to go downhill fast. Perhaps it was because his limitations were exposed by unfamiliar material. Or maybe his vampire wife had taken too many creativity transfusions from him. Whatever the reasons for Guy Ritchie’s perceived decline, that perception may yet prove unfounded.

And lest we forget, before the hideous Swept Away and the dismissed Revolver all was grimy gold. Ritchie freely admits that much of the screenplay for Snatch comes from the leftovers of Lock, Stock and the two movies have been twinned ever since. So, having attracted Brad Pitt, Benicio Del Toro and Dennis Farina from across the pond, Ritchie gathered together most of his usual suspects and reinvented the wheel.

Among the many highlights of Snatch include Pitt’s beautifully rendered “pikey” accent, pop-eyed psycho cum East End thug Brick Top (Alan Ford), the late Mike Reid’s faux-Jewish family and yet another terrific soundtrack. There are nods here to Scorsese, De Palma and even John Woo. Time will tell if Guy Ritchie can return to take his place as an equal among them.