FOUR LIONS
UK, 2010, 97 minutes, Colour.
Riz Ahmed, Nigel Lindsay, Arsher Ali, Kayvan Novak, Craig Parkinson, Benedict Cumberbatch, Darren Boyd.
Directed by Chris Morris.
Satire and parody. How far can you go?
Some cultures are good at satire and enjoy it. The British comedy tradition is in that vein. Americans are less prone as a whole to appreciate irony. Recent events have made satirists and cartoonists very wary about Islam. With Christianity it seems no holds barred.
Those may be some of the thoughts before seeing Four Lions if you have heard that it is a black comedy about suicide bombers and was made by Chris Morris who has had a strong, if chequered, career as a television satirist. Can you make a film on this topic these days – well, he has made it, so the question is should he have made it. Chaplin mocked Hitler and Mussolini in 1940 in The Great Dictator. Perhaps the lines were so easily drawn then, that it didn't matter if the Germans or Italians didn't like it. Now innocent victims of suicide bombers are in our midst and their relatives and friends grieve. Satire, mockery? The quickest answer is that if this does not sound like your sense of humour, then simply don't go. If you feel that one way of coping with the terrible consequences of fanatical beliefs is to show the ridiculous side of such behaviour and the less-than-heroism and even stupidity of those who believe that they are martyrs with instant entree into heaven, then here you are.
Four Lions is often cleverly written and, at times, makes for some laugh out loud comedy. Riz Ahmed (Road to Guantanamo) has decided that the best thing to do, given the terrible state of the world, is to commit an atrocity and blow bystanders up with himself. Two of his friends (and now disciples) are, to put it kindly, very slow-witted. This offers an occasion for mocking the taping of the video messages, for instance, let alone the inefficiency of the attempts by amateurs like these. The other member of the team is Barry, Anglo- Saxon, but a convert to terrorist Islam where he has made a place for himself that he could not do in real life. He is the critic and the contradictor.
They go to Pakistan for some training but are fairly hopeless and get sent home.
They are also essentially British and they fall back on different taken-for-granted little details of British life and customs, TV and music, food, ordinary jobs in the workplace, which shows the mixed motives that have not been sorted out.
Eventually, they set on a plan to sabotage the London Marathon. Most things that could go wrong do go wrong but in a deadly way – which is a means of questioning the religious and/or fanatical beliefs that would persuade men and women to offer themselves as suicide bombers. (For a very serious look at two bombers from Palestine going into Israel, Paradise Now is well worth seeing – as well as the Israeli films, Omar, Bethlehem and Rock the Casbah.)
1. A 21st-century story? Islam? The UK? Pakistan? The events of the 21st century, terrorism, Jihad mentality, suicide bombers, recruits and training?
2. The tone, satire, parody? Serious intent by satire?
3. The heightened characters, situations? How real? Foolish, destructive?
4. Islam and humour – very limited? Western comedy mocking the US, but not Jihad, Taliban?
5. The UK city, the North, jobs, security guard, homes and families? London, the Marathon, on the streets, the running, the shops, the kebab diner, authentic?
6. Omar as the leader, his life at home, his wife and family, his work, his friend, getting him to cover for his visit to Pakistan? Waz and his friendship? The encounter with Barry, his leadership, the car, Barry’s wanting to go to Pakistan? Omar and Waz going? The reception, hostile, domineering, their cases and their stuff have been taken, the warnings? Waz taking the photos of himself with the gun? The weapons? The drone, Omar and his firing the missile, back to front? Killing his own side? Their hurrying back to the UK?
7. The support of his wife and her understanding?
8. Barry, the convert, being on the panel, the MP and the other members, the speeches about Islam? His haranguing tone? The young man in the audience, the warning about the bomb, the false explosion, the aftermath, his being in the street, Barry offering him a lift? Recruited? The other members at the mosque? The indoctrination?
9. Barry, his ideology, Islamic dress, still being very British, his swearing, his whole sense of culture? Adopting Islam, as a veneer?
10. Omar, his sensibilities? Waz being confused? the members of the group, the practice, going over the fence, the exploding sheep? The dance and the weapons?
11. Foolishness, stupidity, the plan, the drive to London, the odd costumes, Omar seeing his co-worker? The running of the Marathon?
12. The explosions, the man trying to help and being killed, Barry and the wall? Waz and his being in the kebab shop, the hostages, the phone calls, confused, Omar trying to get him straight? His death?
13. Omar, decisions, the phone calls to Was? Omar, the chase, his co-worker? His going into the shop, his death?
14. The negotiator, his style, interrogations, attempt to talk Waz down? The snipers, their shooting – and declaring that because someone was shot that meant it was that real target?
15. The aftermath?
16. The influence of this film in the UK, holding the terrorists up to ridicule?
