Kicking Off | Film review - Cockney football comedy is all over the gaff

Kicking Off Greg McHugh Alistair Petrie Warren Brown

(Image credit: © Signature Entertainment)

Two Cockney football fans kidnap the referee after a crucial game goes against their team in tiresome, very sweary comedy Kicking Off.

"Gormless barmpots"

Cockney football fans Wigsy (Warren Brown) and Cliff (Greg McHugh) kidnap the referee (Alistair Petrie) after a crucial game goes against their team, but they really haven't a clue what to do with him. And neither has Kicking Off, a tiresome, very sweary comedy that is almost as half-witted as its protagonists.

Director Matt Wilde does supply one or two deft visual touches - such as a nifty match cut from the bottom of a lager glass to an amber traffic light. But the duo are such gormless barmpots that spending the best part of 90 minutes in their company is almost as much of an ordeal for the viewer as it is for the poor ref.

Certificate 15. Runtime 85 mins. Director Matt Wilde

Kicking Off debuts on Sky Cinema Premiere on Monday 6 March and is available on DVD from Precision Pictures.

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A film critic for over 25 years, Jason admits the job can occasionally be glamorous – sitting on a film festival jury in Portugal; hanging out with Baz Luhrmann at the Chateau Marmont; chatting with Sigourney Weaver about The Archers – but he mostly spends his time in darkened rooms watching films. He’s also written theatre and opera reviews, two guide books on Rome, and competed in a race for Yachting World, whose great wheeze it was to send a seasick film critic to write about his time on the ocean waves. But Jason is happiest on dry land with a classic screwball comedy or Hitchcock thriller.