‘Blue Story': Bold Drama Tackles Southeast London Gangs [Review]

Smack dab inside the London projects, high-school hoodlums enter a vicious turf war in YouTube star Rapman’s auspicious narrative debut, “Blue Story.”

Interrupting action with long-form raps that comment on the plot like a Greek tragedy, Rapman shows great promise in the way he stages his drama, most notably in the action, as the young filmmaker creates an impeccable atmosphere with the mise-en-scene at his disposal — think “Boyz n the Hood,” but set in South East London and you’ll get a better idea of what’s in store for you here.

Grabbing your attention from the get-go, Rapman delivers an opening montage featuring real-life footage of British gangs with machetes and knives swirling around crime-infested London. The message is clear: the system has collapsed in this part of town.

Caught up in the crossfires of this broken system are two boys, best friends Timmy (Stephen Odubola) and Marco (Micheal Ward), who go to the same high school in Peckham, but live in different, rivalrous neighborhoods. Marco lives with his hardworking mother and older brother Switcher (Eric Kofi-Abrefa), the latter a notorious gang leader who asks his young bro to join him as an ally in the bloodbath of violence outside. Timmy is more straight-edged, trying to dismiss Marco’s influence, bypassing the time with crush Leah (a vibrant Karla-Simone Spence).

Inevitably, all hell breaks loose, alliances are threatened, and Marco starts to see Timmy as a threat. Shakespearean and Greek drama influences start to flood through the frames as tragedy and romance collide in a story as old as time. We’ve seen it all before, and much like in the late John Singleton’s “Boyz n the Hood,” mothers will have to bury their children, but Rapman, a YouTube star, born Andrew Onwubolu in South-East London, writes, directs, and acts like his life depends on it. His trilogy of short films dubbed Shiro’s Story went viral in 2018, but he graduates to the big leagues with “Blue Story.”

The fact that Rapman finds ways to shock us, despite the propagation of violence in mass media, is impressive enough — the filmmaker has a knack for directing his action scenes with intense fervor — but it’s the way he tries to shake up a tired old formula that makes you pay attention. The musical interludes are a surprisingly effective creative stroke. In them, Rapman suddenly appears to narrate significant plot points with musical verve, much like a Greek chorus or the character of John Gower in Shakespeare’s “Pericles, Prince of Tyre.”

The familiarity in Rapman’s themes and subject matter does at times give way for clumsiness. Rapman’s ambitions can sometimes get out of hand as themes of love, friendship, betrayal, and revenge collide in none-too-subtle ways, turning the stakes into a kind of preachy melodrama. Although it clocks in at just 91 minutes, the film starts to feel sluggish by the time its predictable third act hits.

Despite all those flaws, and the fact that the London-accented dialogue may require subtitles (thank God for VOD), Rapman somehow manages to keep things fresh thanks to his shot selections and storytelling structure. It helps that the two lead performances from Ward and, especially, Odubola feel lived-in and never off. There’s a powerful sense of place in “Blue Story,” so much so that you tend to wonder if Rapman experienced the same hard-edged neighborhoods so precisely detailed in his film. There’s an immediacy and energy to his direction that cannot be denied by the audience. [B]