Simply Perfect

Fantastic!

This is a coming of age storyline that you've seen in one form or another for decades. It takes a truly unique voice to make yet another one worth watching.

One of the worst ways to make a cult movie is to set out to make a cult movie.

In my personal opinion this title is an excellent overview of Manchester life, as the title says 'A very British Gangster' which anyone living in Manchester will know fully the reputation the Noonans have. (unlike some of the comments made about them i.e 'Clownish Baffoons'???!!!) Desmond's link to major cities across the country made the Noonan's unique, the fact he had the audacity to start dealing with Gangsters from other cities in the UK made them unstoppable. The documentary also portrays Manchester correctly which in some areas is very poor and slum likeAn excellent Film/documentary on life in Manchester, which perhaps doesn't show the full extent of what they are actually capable of !!!!

An crazy look at Dominic Noonan, heir apparent of gang family in modern day Manchester, England. Noonan is a brutish looking individual who wields a lot of power on pure tradition, which makes this profile all the more interesting when it is said that Noonan is openly gay. Compared to US gangsters, Noonan and his crew of (mostly) teenagers might seem like the Spinal Tap of the underworld as they drive around and settle little squabbles. But I think helmer Donal MacIntyre is intentionally going soft on Noonan here as he tends to overlook Noonan's shady investments and downplay his crimes (including a torture attack that sounds particularly vicious). The crew is "lucky" enough to have Noonan's older brother (and reputed hit-man) get murdered while they were in production so they get to cover that as well. This also works as a nice way to compare the US vs. UK legal system as the documentary claims Noonan has been convicted of more than 20 armed robberies (including a hilarious jail bust in order to do robberies), yet still he is let out of prison.

This movie wants the crime boss whoever to be some mythic figure, when he's just top-punk. No insights are made about the nature of crime or poverty. Songs are used over and over again to attempt to make you feel tough when seeing these clownish buffoons. Then they want your sympathy when a man who cannot keep a straight face when asked if murder is wrong, dies.The tone taken is trying to make you look up to this guy when he is just a stupid man hungry for power. I've become very agitated at this documentary and although in some parts, glimpses of the horror this man created, it plays more like a Wikipedia article where entire paragraphs are copied from a biased personal web-page.

After just watching this very insightful documentary into one of Britains most infamous criminals, Dominick Noonan, I got to say I really did like it.Dominick Noonan, born, bred and in his own words...will die in Manchester, has been running the city for years, spending more of his life behind bars than on the outside. He has a MASSIVE reputation, and rightfully so, we hear how and what he done to get his rep (to show whos the boss to a rival gang, he cuts a dog's head off and putting it on a pool table in a pub, now known as THE DOGS HEAD, then promptly says next time it will be a human's head)...but he actually comes across as quite a decent guy too...just don't get on the wrong side of him!He does a lot for the community, offers services to rival the police(people actually get hold of him rather than the police to sort domestic problems i.e noisy neighbours, people who owe money etc, etc... because he is more likely to get the problem sorted with better results), as well as running his own security firm.All credit to the the film-maker Donal Mcintyre, he follows Dominick around over a period of time, and we get to know a lot of his posse, mainly made up of teenage lads, but some of the questions he gets out of Dominick are unbelievable, anybody else would surely of had a cricket bat wrapped round their head! The documentary also involves Dominics' brother, who was a self-confessed ganglord, who was tragically murdered, and we see the unbelievable scenes where the majority of the city came to a complete standstill on the day of his funeral.This is a REAL documentary..not a film, so don't expect FOOTBALL FACTORY or RISE OF THE FOOTSOLDIER, this is real, uncompromising footage of one of Britains most infamous gangsters.