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Fisticuffs (2004) Online

Fisticuffs (2004) Online
2004 Paul Benzing Terry Kvasnik Clare McKenna Miranda Pennell
Original Title :
Fisticuffs
Genre :
Movie / Drama / Short
Year :
2004
Directror :
Miranda Pennell
Cast :
Paul Benzing,Terry Kvasnik,Clare McKenna
Writer :
Miranda Pennell
Budget :
£30,000
Type :
Movie
Time :
10min
Rating :
6.6/10

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A bloke walks into a pub... Six actors punch, kick and wrestle their way through the Wild West of an East London drinking establishment

Fisticuffs (2004) Online

In FISTICUFFS Miranda Pennell has taken inspiration from the ritual of theWestern bar-brawl, and placed it in a London working men's club.Her formal approach (to choreography, framing and editing) ensures that theviewer is constantly aware of the choreographed nature of the violence. This violence appears to have no consequences, the actors bodies being as rubbery and invulnerable as those in TV Westerns of the 60's and 70's
Credited cast:
Paul Benzing Paul Benzing
Terry Kvasnik Terry Kvasnik
Rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Clare McKenna Clare McKenna


User reviews

Kemath

Kemath

A man walks into a British social club for a drink and a smoke. As he walks along the bar, there seem to be very few situations where he doesn't get into some sort of minor fight. After several tries he finally makes it (pint in hand) to a table and sits down to light up – sadly, he is not the only one getting involved in the pub fight mentality and it isn't long before it is all kicking off again.

This short was billed as a sort of violent dance and I was interested enough to take a look. Despite a slow start that suggested this would be just one repetitive joke, the film did get better although never as good as I had hoped. I may be reading too much into it but I thought it used the working mans club scene well with the very British focus on yob culture, fighting and drinking; the main fights are set alongside line dancing – that other mainstay of social drinking clubs. As a piece of social commentary it has nothing but I don't think that was the point to be honest. Instead it tries to be funny and amusingly violent.

As a comedy I didn't think it was inventive enough to really be hilarious although most of it is amusing in a silly manner. The one thing that I did find distasteful was the very brutal violence directed toward the woman character. Maybe I'm being a prude but I would have preferred it to be an all-male affair; of course some viewers may find the idea of violence for the sake of humour to be a little distasteful anyway, but my morals are not set that high! In terms of being a dance of sorts it isn't good enough. The fights are not that inventive apart from once or twice – I didn't expect Jackie Chan stuff here but if it had pushed the boat out with some funny moves then the film would have been better. The cast do OK to seem calm and portray it all as an everyday thing but they could have been funnier.

Overall this is an OK film that is worth seeing once maybe just to see what it's like, but don't expect too much. The violence is not that inventive and is a bit brutal at some points and, although it is amusing, it is never clever enough to really be hilarious. A strange short film find but not one I'll be hunting out again.