Name: Zebra Crossing
Genre: Drama
Released: 2011-01-28
Duration: 1 h 33 min
Rating: 5.5
Cast: Lee Turnbull, Greg Wakeham, Aaron White

Zebra Crossing is a kinetic black and white film (with a touch of colour at the end.) It is inspired by the French Film La Haine (The Hate.)

It is set in tower blocks in South London and focuses on a group of young white men on the edge and fatalistic which the media will have us believe are unrepresented in British television or film.

My word they do seem to be the subject of a lot of low budget films. How about some films of young white men living in a council estate with a job and just doing their best to make something of themselves legitimately sometime this millennium?

These group of four young men are not nice. They are racist, homophobic, petty thieves and come to the attention of the police.

Right at the start we see them bashing two gay men, later inciting racial violence. They are on the verge of going to a dark path unchecked.

Tommy is the most wild, unpredictable and violent. Justin his best friend is excluded from college with a sick, disabled sister, a violent, drunk father and whose mother has abandoned them.

Justin seems to want out of the spiral and shows a sensitive side. He seeks solace in a church where he encounters a mysterious black man.

When the gang enter a world of hard drugs, drug dealing and later become skinheads the outcome looks bleak and divisions are exposed.

The film is kinetic and wild, especially the way it's edited but the debut director loses focus now and then and some of it does not make sense.

It does not help that the film lacks light, with so many not nice people, the viewer can be easily repulsed and offended by the actions of these men. However the main issue is that apart from a slice of life in a council tower block setting, the film does not offer much by way of a coherent story.

The drama genre is a broad category that features stories portraying human experiences, emotions, conflicts, and relationships in a realistic and emotionally impactful way. Dramas delve into the complexities of human life, often exploring themes of love, loss, morality, societal issues, personal growth, with the aim to evoke an emotional response from the audience by presenting relatable and thought-provoking stories.

Mahershala Ali and Alex R. Hibbert in Moonlight (2016)

"From the moment I was born I cried for a month..." Eighteen years on, and Justin is no nearer the truth. And in a world that increasingly doesn't care, maybe just simply relying on friendship is not enough? Especially with friends like Billy, Sean and Tommy. Set amongst the backdrop of the towering, concrete-clad estates of south London 'Zebra Crossings' blends a diverse mixture of characters that all share one thing in common: The incredible loneliness of living alongside 7 million other people. Blending the surreal, and very real, we take an intense journey in search of friendship, belief and religion. With a lacklustre father and estranged mother, Justin's only source of perennial control comes from an unlikely source, his bed-ridden sister Suzanne. But Justin needs is a real mentor, a father figure, someone who can provide guidance before it's all too late. In steps Marcus, unlike anyone Justin has ever known before, calm, soft, assured - but does he want something from Justin? Meanwhile, Tommy's abandonment issues haunt him once again, and his class-A drug addiction has sent him into full destruction mode. Also, the pressure from a rival gang has reached exploding point - as there is certainly no space for two crews in this neighbourhood. Justin must find the answer to it all, and quick.

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Zebra Crossing

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