Down Terrace

A sort of British “Sopranos” by way of Ken Loach-style social realism, DOWN TERRACE is the darkest of comedies, a genre-breaking movie about inept felons at home who are trying to keep their two-bit business together. Bill and Karl are a father-and-son outfit, career criminals fresh out of prison, where they've been doing time for some unnamed crime. Now they're back, and Bill's wife Maggie keeps the home fires burning with moral support, criminal advice, and an endless supply of tea. Bill is a choleric dealer, poet, and folk-guitar-playing acolyte of Timothy Leary. Karl is a nail-chewing, violent young man who wants out of the family business while wondering if his evil genes will pass on to his unborn child. Their flat is soon crowded with an assortment of unsavory characters, including a hated family friend named Garvey, Pringle the Irish hit man who takes his preschooler along to jobs, a brutal thug named Eric, and Karl's pregnant girlfriend. As Bill, Karl, and Maggie try to decide which of them might have ratted them out to the cops, the loud thud of bodies falling nearly drowns out the folk song-laden soundtrack. With family and friends like these, who needs enemies? – B.B.