Disc Reviews

Bonded by Blood 2 (2017) DVD Review

• 28th May 2017

In 1995 a Range Rover was discovered in the countryside outside of Rettendon, Essex with its occupants murdered at close range by shotguns. The names of the occupants have gone down in local mythology. Among them were Tony Tucker and Patrick Tate, a pair of local hoods who ran the territory importing and selling ecstasy tablets from the Netherlands throughout Essex. This story and the mystery behind it have set off a whole sub-genre of British gangster films starting with Essex Boys (2000) and more recently a whole canon of similar films, including Rise of the Footsoldier (2007) and The Fall of the Essex Boys (2013) and Bonded by Blood (2010). Once this subject had been milked, sequels and spin-offs of the story followed, among them were Essex Boys: Retribution (2013), Rise of the Footsldier Part II  (2015) and the latest release, Bonded by Blood 2 (2017) as it follows characters in the wake of the Rettendon murders. So mythologised is the story that the cover of the DVD release not only has one of the support players, Terry Stone playing Tony Tucker as the main figure on the DVD sleeve but also depicts the Rettendon killings rather than action more pertinent to the film.

The film is spoken by a narrator to someone investigating how the vaccuum that was filled following the Rettendon murders. This further fuels the mythology narrative. The story that follows is based off a book by Bernhard O’Mahoney, an associate of Pat Tate and a former nightclub bouncer who knew the murdered Rettendon gang. Many of the films mentioned above were based off books by Mahoney. The conclusion can be drawn that Mahoney has single handedly kept the myth of the Rettendon murders. This film too adds another story to the myth that follows on from the Rettendon murders covered in Bonded by Blood. Again, said to be based off a true story, the plot centres on another set of gangland killings that led to the simple execution of a young and easily influenced young man and petty thief named Dean Boshell (Sam Strike). The plot of the film posits that the man serving time for the murders following an attempt at a police sting is serving 28 years for a murder he did not commit and that the real murderer was the unbalanced Damon Alvin (George Russo), an asocial crook and former associate of the imprisoned Ricky Percival (Josh Myers).

There is lots of tough guy dialogue, if you think constantly calling someone a “facking cant” is tough guy dialogue. Russo, looking more like a psychotic Steve Buscemi and Josh Myers as the other member of the gang who displays a brooding nastiness as he suggests to revenge himself on a murdered fellow gang member he wants to cut up the faces of his rivals children play two of the principles. Meanwhile, further support is also added by Chris Ellison, recently seen in We Still Kill the Old Way (2014) and its sequel, an actor who also seemed at home as either an East End gangster or a cop. This time he is closer to his role as D.I. Burnside in ‘The Bill’ as the detective trying to collar the bad guys. The film’s producer is Jonathan Sothcott who has made his career out of making these genre films.

Bonded by Blood 2 risks being lost among all the other similar films, although, like Essex Boys: Retribution it does go some way to at least attempt to move away from the original Essex Boys story, but barely. For some 20 years now there have been a whole bunch of gangster films of this type with the protagonists effing and jeffing their way through the genre and focussing on some particularly unsavoury characters. It would seem that for the time being the only way is Essex.

The only extra on the disc is a behind the scenes featurette.

Chris Hick