Protein
A Welsh-set Shane Meadowsy gangland drama, with one especially grotesque, gruesome element. Traumatised ex-army drifter Sion (Craig Russell) arrives in a down-at-heel town and harrassed, overworked single Mum Katrina (Kezia Burrows) offers him an off-the-books job cleaning toilets and floors in a grubby gym. The criminal set-up is already complicated enough, with alpha bouncer Dwayne (Kai Owen) ticked off that club-owner Joe Llewelyn (Richard Mylan) is doing deals with Albanians to push gear in his place and roping together his little cadre of mixed-ability mates to go into business for themselves. With a cocaine stash entrusted to stuttering idiot Kevin (Steve Meo), disaster seems obviously in the offing – but Sion has noted Dwayne casually abusing Katrina and turns up at his place with a hammer and a hacksaw.
Sion is considerably odder than a Welsh miserablist version of the Punisher, since he’s picked up a Cannibal Apocalypse-ish habit in Afghanistan and carves up criminal victims in order to use their meat in protein shakes which beef up his muscle. In Man With No Name fashion, but seemingly without intent, Sion’s serial killings spark off tit-for-tat murders between Dwayne’s surviving crew and the Albanians – and a pizza-delivering hit man (Dhean Morris), as methodical and messy as Sion, gets involved. Meanwhile, Patch (Andrea Hall), who has been tracking Sion from London, teams up with apparent burnout local copper Stanton (Charles Dale), who’s got his own agenda as bodies drop (and splat) all over town.
We’ve probably had too many PTSD vigilantes with deeply-concealed soft spots for innocent parties, but Russell – reprising a role from director Tony Burke’s 2014 short – is excellent as the undemonstrative, purposeful maniac and the film surrounds him with well-characterised fringe folk who don’t realise how instrumental he is in the terrible things that happen to them. Ross O’Hennessy, Richard Elis and Gareth John Bale are in the doomed gang, for different reasons – and all make bad decisions before they meet Sion – while Hall and Dale work up a nice initially-hostile, eventually-respectful relationship as a couple of worn-down cops tempted to let an actual serial killer cut through all the red tape surrounding crooks everyone knows are responsible for much more mayhem than the lone avenger. Too many downbeat British grungy crime movies tend to be ridiculously dour, but this has a sly, macabre streak of humour which gives it more pep.
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