Gassed Up | |
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Directed by | George Amponsah |
Screenplay by | Archie Maddocks Taz Skylar |
Produced by |
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Starring | |
Cinematography | Stefan Ciupek |
Edited by | Richard Ketteridge |
Music by | Henry Counsell |
Production companies |
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Distributed by | Amazon Prime Video |
Release date |
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Running time | 102 minutes |
Country | United Kingdom |
Language | English |
Gassed Up is a 2023 British film directed by George Amponsah in his feature film debut, and starring Stephen Odubola. It is co-written by Archie Maddocks with Taz Skylar, who also appears in the film. The film premiered at the 2023 BFI London Film Festival.
A member of a moped street-gang in London, Ash (Odubola) uses his earnings from petty thefts to support his family, but he struggles with the moral complexities of his actions when a jewellery heist alerts an Albanian crime family to his crew. [1]
The film was greenlit by Amazon Prime Video in July 2022 to be produced by Rupert Preston and Ed Caffrey of Sunrise Films, Bart Ruspoli and Hester Ruoff of Ascendant Fox and Stefan D’Bart of Bromantics. The script was co-written by Archie Maddocks and Taz Skylar who also appears as an Albanian-born criminal. It is directed by George Amponsah. [2] The term "gassed up"is slang for someone who has delusions of grandeur. [3]
Stephen Odubola leads the cast. [4] Singer and British Eurovision entrant Mae Muller was approached to work on music for the film and appears in the film in her debut acting role. [5] The film also includes performances by YouTubers Harry Pinero, Yung Filly and Ms Banks. [6]
The film premiered on 10 October 2023 at the 2023 BFI London Film Festival. [7] [8]
Tom Davidson in the Evening Standard praised the performance of Odubola, and some of the action shots which use GoPro cameras attached to the gang's mopeds, but considered the film to use too many cliched tropes. [9] Kevin Maher in The Times praised the "sharp" performances and the "deceptively smart" script, but described the film as "shakiest" when developing the Albanian gangster aspects of the plot and it "diverges from the earthy amphetamine-fuelled Ken Loach energy to something far more glossy and Tinseltown-lite". [10]
The film won the Audience Award for Best Feature at the 2023 London Film Festival. [11]
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George Bernard Amponsah is a British film director, who is most notable for his documentaries. His 2015 feature-length documentary film, The Hard Stop, about the death of Mark Duggan, won a 2017 BAFTA nomination for the Award for Outstanding Debut by a British Writer, Director or Producer. In 2023, Amponsah completed direction of his first drama feature, Gassed Up – described by The Guardian as "A Scorsese-like thrill ride" – which had a UK nationwide cinema release in February 2024, and subsequently played on the Amazon Prime streaming platform.
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