Mean Machine (Wide Screen) > Reviews > I'm dreaming of a happy prison

Author's product rating:   

Did you enjoy it?	Indifferent to it
Story	Very ordinary
Characters / Performances	Unmemorable
Special Effects	Weak
Soundtrack	Weak

Advantages:	Can be funny and good when there's nothing else on
Disadvantages:	Most would probably find it to be a joke

Recommend to potential buyers:

yes

Full review

Don't you just love it when a movie on television just reaches out and grabs you, compelling you to watch the remaining two hours. Well maybe Mean Machine didn't exactly grab me as I saw it in the Channel 4 line-up, but with nothing else to really watch you can't argue with a Sunday night movie. Of course my experiences with Ch4 movies haven't been great, I seem to remember the last one I watched was Cabin Fever, one of my most hated movies of all time, so how did Mean Machine fair at filling in that gap in the schedule between 10pm and midnight?

I literally knew nothing about Mean Machine, I'm pretty sure it is a film title I have heard of in passing but it wasn't until my dad piped up about not liking this as a remake that I finally clicked that I wasn't watching an original. My bad. Mean Machine is said to be a 2001 remake of the original 'Longest Yard' movie, which that itself has had an American remake in more recent years. Mean Machine is a purely British film though, and that is just stamped in permanent ink by the fact that the lead role is played by Vinnie Jones himself.

Generally I'm not a Vinnie Jones fan, and I remember one of the things I hated the most about 'Euro Trip' was Vinnie Jones' cameo, so if I hate a film because of his cameo role how am I ever going to approve of a role where he is the star. Vinnie plays Danny Meehan, who is a former footballing role model turned enemy number one due to the fact that he threw an England game. Danny's fall from grace has culminated in when we see him racing down roads, drunk driving, and then assaulting the police officers in his drunken state. This quick brush up on the reason why he is in prison takes no time at all, so we can enter the real prison drama of the movie. Now making a prison seem like a realistic environment on screen takes a lot of work, and anyone that tries it has a lot to live up to now that I have seen the joys of real gritty prison shows such as 'Prison Break'. I do not believe that I ever saw a date flash up on the screen of when this movie is supposed to be set, although it definitly didn't appear to be set in this new millennium. Judging from the fact that the original film was made in the 70's, I'd imagine they were trying to recreate that atmosphere. I just don't know a lot about the 70's, seeing as I wasn't born until 1989. Hell, I don't even know anything about the 90's really.

Just as it didn't take long for Danny to end up in jail, it doesn't take long for us to get to the core of the storyline and that is that the Govenor (David Hemmings), remembered for his funny eyebrows, wanting Danny to coach his team of guards in a bid to try and get the money back that he has invested in the team. There's quite a few random characters in the film that I never really got to familarise myself with, but it seems the guards don't want Danny coaching them - but then he goes ahead and does it anyway. The whole Danny versus the bad guys in prison only seems to last for about five minutes, with a few flashes here and there, so I guess the director didn't want to focus on the divisions in prison all that much either. And that is because the heavy topic of the movie is the football, and Danny arranges for there to be a game of the guards against the cons. This means the whole remainder of the movie is going to be a training session really up to the big finale of the game where the guards have everything to lose and the cons everything to gain.

Watching more recent British films there are a lot of characters that you will recognise, to name just a few I will bring up Danny Dyer plays a supporting role in the film as Billy the Limpet, who is pretty awful on the bitch but sees Meehan as his idol. And we all know that Dyer has now gone on to probably be the biggest star in British movies, maybe even earning a reputation as a new Vinnie Jones - but one with talent. There is also Sykes (John Forgeham, 'Footballers Wives') who is the big daddy of the prison, and a whole host of faces you may remember from passing in 'The Business' and 'Green Street'. David Kelly, 'Charlie and the Chocolate Factory', also plays an elderly prisoner who knows he will never be able to make up for his crimes. There are prison themes such as men being made other mens bitches and a racist divide, but they are not very prominent.

Overall I thought the film was pretty pants, and at the start I was watching it for the fun of it, although that is not to say that it didn't get somewhat entertaining. As I mentioned slightly earlier, this was one of the better peformances I have seen from Jones, so you maybe able to make me a fan of his yet. With a 15 certificate this is a movie for youths around that edge to enjoy, especially if they are football fanatics, but that's not to say that this film ever takes off for any interest group as anything but mediocre.