You are not able to participate in a UK crime show right now. Whether it’s Q on Netflix or puberty; the Moore group on Paramount; or the slow horse on Apple TV Plus (even if technically it’s more of a spy show), gritty brutal content also appears on the best streaming services, all delivered in a vibrant British accent.
The deep cover feels like a real crowd.
But the transformation is happening. We are about to enter the comfortable crime summer when the genre will receive lighthearted comedy, thanks in large part to the highly anticipated adaptation of Richard Osman’s Murder Club Book series on Thursday, which is scheduled to land on Netflix this August.
Meanwhile, Prime Video first goes into the deep cover – the best way to flip British crime scripts from serious to stupid.
In the video on June 12 on Prime Video, three unlikely improvisers of the improvisers, all of the different skill levels, were recruited as undercover police and infiltrated into London’s underworld, theoretically to destroy the drug ring. Needless to say, chaos followed.
Bryce Dallas Howard plays the failed stand-up comic “The Improvisation Teacher”, where she tied her two of her most unfortunate students to the gang: the grandeur’s delusional method actor played by Orlando Bloom, and the Neuro IT Office nerd played by Nick Mohammed. The three nicknamed themselves Bonnie, Roach and Squire, tricked them by meeting with the gangster bosses, each one being more scary than the next, and somehow managed to find friendship and romance in the process.
Last week, I premiered at the film premiere at London SXSW and was convinced that this weekend, the deep cover should be on everyone’s watch list. The combination of comedy and action puts it in the realm of everyone’s delight, somewhere between the hot fluff and the autumn guy.
Of the three stars of Deep Cover, Mohammed has the most mature comedy and gets the biggest laugh (you probably know most that he is Ted Lasso’s Nathan Shelley, a rebellious kit to become a rival coach). That’s not to say Bloom, who is out of his comfort zone in the role and Howard is not delivering it. The chemistry between the three main characters makes you cheer them for a long time after their “yes” and “…” improvisational secret work seems to fail them.
The film’s director Tom Kingsley also worked on the TV show Stath that won BAFTA, let Flats (available on Max), the most Greek and British TV show you wish to watch, and I’ve long believed it’s an important comic. The deep cover has the same awkwardness, almost a sarcastic echo of humor, but behind it is an Amazon-sized budget.
Still, as Kingsley explained in the Q&A session after the premiere, the budget is much smaller than anyone expected of such a production. Joining Hollywood stars Bloom and Johnson attracted more money, and Amazon jumped on more money. But the film was reportedly produced by Hollywood standards.
Nevertheless, it’s easy to see where the cash injection is. The action scenes of Deep Cover are sometimes weird board-playing, perfect for the three clowns in their center, sometimes so graphic or high octane that they aren’t always with the overall tenor of the movie. In the scheme of things, this is a little trouble and should not stop you.
Despite all its stupidity and stunt performance, deep cover is ultimately a heart-warming story about developing into a friendship at that stage in life, when the moments of these opportunities are over.
If you are looking for something simple and fun to watch this weekend, then look for nothing.
