Get Carter [M]

London gangster and strong-arm mob man, Jack Carter, returns to his provincial hometown of Newcastle following his brother’s questionable death. Jack suspects foul play and determines to wage a one-man war to find those responsible and deal out justice. But Jack’s reappearance in Newcastle touches a nerve with local crooks and it fast becomes apparent that his brother’s ‘death’ is connected with something much larger. 

Morality, chivalry, and routine are completely chucked out the window when it comes to this movie. Get Carter boasts no romance, no heroes, no real climactic thrills, and no happy ending. I’m sort of in two minds as to whether I liked it or not. 

London gangster and strong-arm mob man, Jack Carter, returns to his provincial hometown of Newcastle following his brother’s questionable death. Jack suspects foul play and determines to wage a one-man war to find those responsible and deal out justice. But Jack’s reappearance in Newcastle touches a nerve with local crooks and it fast becomes apparent that his brother’s ‘death’ is connected with something much larger. 

Adapted from the novel Jack’s Return Home by Ted Lewis, Mike Hodges’ screenplay is really rather something to be admired as, considering that this movie is now forty years old, it still manages to deliver the audience sharp blow after sharp blow and keep them captivated with its sincerity and the unsettling and biting precision with which it’s written. In this movie, nothing is sacred: death and violence are dealt out without the slightest shadow of thought, women are seduced and then degraded to the level of whore or porn actress (not without being subjected to a bit of shaking, slapping, and verbal abuse first), and there is no love, no passion, indeed no human feeling to be found anywhere. I appreciate this movie primarily for its screenplay because it depicts this cold and unfeeling world without gussying it up with jagged camera movements, lack of colour or light, depressing emo music, and whatever other tricks of the trade that are employed in modern ‘doom and gloom’ cinema. Because we are so used to seeing films that exaggerate the gloominess of the setting and the story, it comes as a shock when we see the real thing and for that reason alone, Get Carter and in particular Mike Hodges, should be applauded. 

Michael Caine stars as the antihero himself and he delivers a performance that is dripping with cold precision, unfeeling alacrity, he’s more like a machine than a man. Most of the flick’s most memorable scenes feature Michael just standing there and staring, including the most iconic in which he shoos a couple of thugs away from his bed and breakfast, butt naked with a rifle. He’s really something, Michael Caine. 

Starring Ian Hendry, Britt Ekland, john Osborne, Tony Beckley, Geraldine Moffat, Dorothy White, Rosemarie Dunham, Petra Markham, Alun Armstrong, Bryan Mosley, Glynn Edwards, Bernard Hepton, Terence Rigby, and George Sewell, Get Carter is a clever and captivating movie filled with action, violence, sex, and revenge. I don’t think I can consider it a real classic, but it’s definitely a movie that makes you rethink the popular structure of movies and how simplicity is really the most violent of shocks to the audience. Like the saying goes: “less is more”.