Hello, you handsome devils.
I watched MobLand this weekend. The whole thing, in one long, slightly indulgent Netflix stretch that I have not let myself have in a very long time.
I don't really watch TV anymore. It's not a principled stance or some intellectual flex; it's just that most of it doesn't hold me these days, and I would usually rather read. So for something to get me to actually sit down, stay down, and finish it over a weekend is rare, and MobLand did exactly that, which is why I'm writing about it.
My first instinct, if I'm honest, was to roll my eyes a little. Another London gangster story. More violence, more lads in overcoats, more brooding men in warehouses. And then I saw it had Tom Hardy (who I will happily watch in anything) and Guy Ritchie's name on it, and thought, alright, this can’t not be good.
What kept running through my head the whole way through was that Guy Ritchie has simply found his formula and never felt the need to abandon it. The London underworld. The stylised, almost theatrical violence. The dialogue that is somehow sharp and daft in exactly the right measure. Actors who are visibly having a great time. And the music, which has been ridiculously good in everything he has ever made, not just the early stuff. The man scores a scene like nobody else!
It isn't rinse and repeat, though.
It's closer to a brilliant chef who has spent a career perfecting one cuisine, and every dish that comes out is unmistakably theirs and still somehow fresh. Snatch, RocknRolla, The Gentlemen, and now this. You always know it's him within about ninety seconds, and I mean that as the highest compliment.
I don't have a grand takeaway here. I just found it genuinely satisfying to watch someone who knows exactly what he's good at and keeps doing it, at a very high level, without apologising for it or trying to reinvent himself into something he isn't. No pretension. No chasing whatever is fashionable this year. Just doing his thing, brilliantly, again.
And that is so much rarer than it should be.
So, good job, Guy. Now please release Season 2 soon.
M.
M’s Currents
A small thing I loved this week: no structure or theme, just sharing some favourites.
Books: Just finished My Friends by Fredrik Backman and it couldn’t be further away from MobLand. Fredrik is one of my favourite authors of all time because every story of his has made me tear up and chuckle about 2 minutes apart. Too real for some, always extraordinarily human for me.
xx
Manuja
Not for everyone. Never was.
