Movies battling over hooligans

14 April 2012

The ugly scenes that marred England's Euro 2004 qualifier win over Turkey in April have put the issue of football hooliganism back in the public eye.

What the film companies all seem to be searching for, however, is a footballing version of Trainspotting. As the author who penned the original about Edinburgh heroin addicts, Irvine Welsh, who is writing and directing a film about Cardiff City's Soul Crew, would appear to have the best chance.

But he faces competition from The Football Factory, John King's book about life with the Chelsea Headhunters, and Congratulations, You Have Just Met The ICF, Cass Pennant's travels with the West Ham firm, who had a penchant for leaving calling cards on their victims after which the film is named.

So why this sudden spurt of hoolie flicks?

Students of the hooligan genre will recall ID, a moderately successful movie with an excellent cameo from Warren Clarke as a psychotic neo-nazi pub landlord/hooligan in the 1990s and, in the late 1980s, The Firm, a TV drama starring Gary Oldman and based in Hornchurch.

Vertigo Films' James Richardson, producer of The Football Factory, said: "These films are always made at similar times and there's no particular reason for it. Ours will be out first so we're not worried - Soul Crew hasn't even been written yet.

"We want to create a seminal film.

What Trainspotting did for drug culture, we want to do for hooligans. The film is about a bunch of friends, their relationships and the world they live in. Everyone thinks hooliganism has gone underground but that's not the case. There have been some major set-piece fights in the last few months. It's never gone away and we're raising the debate.

"It's going to be authentic, with a couple of big set-pieces, Chelsea fans attacking Spurs and Millwall. It's very real and we show what happens. It's very ugly, messy and not much fun. It provides a big adrenaline rush for some but there is a price to pay and we want to show both sides. We're not taking a moral stance but are putting the issue out there."

There are some familiar faces involved with The Football Factory. It stars Frank Harper, of Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels fame, is directed by Nick Love, who made Goodbye Charlie Bright, and the joint producer is Human Traffic's Allan Niblo. Six weeks of shooting finished yesterday and the film will be released next spring.

The explosion of hooligan memoirs over the last decade has been a publishing revolution.

Pennant, one of a number of shaven-headed, reformed bad-boys who now spend their time nibbling canapes at book launches around the capital, produced his first manuscript while inside Wormwood Scrubs in 1979, but won little interest.

The breakthrough came 10 years later with Colin Ward's Steaming In, an account of Arsenal fans in the 1960s and 1970s that was runner-up in the William Hill Sports Book of the Year Award. The floodgates opened.

Pennant said: "After years of banging on the door I got an offer from Kate Kray to feature in a chapter of her book, Hard Bastards, about true crime. I turned her down but my Mrs changed my mind. I went back to her and said I'd be her hooligan if she'd set up a meeting with her publisher.

"I met John Blake and he wanted to publish my autobiography, Cass, which went straight into the bestsellers list. He wanted to know if there was any more so we did ICF, which sold 100 copies less than Margaret Thatcher's Statecraft. We're still a thorn in her side!"

The appeal of Pennant's books appears to a combination of voyeurism and nostalgia. Middle-class fans are happy to gorge themselves on violence from the safety of the Home Counties, while retired hooligans want to relive deeds of derring-do.

Pennant said: "The books are popular with people in all walks of life. I thought they'd be big in places like Bermondsey, but I met with the head of WH Smith and was told I sold best in Cheltenham. People like to look into another world.

"We're also providing a social history as the hooligan phenomenon was an important part of British culture. It was more than just violence and an important sub-culture. It was about fashion and music and we led the world in both fields. We made our own fashion and it's important for youngsters today to recognise that. They have no music, no fashion and are slaves to the Playstation."

The hooliganism at the Stadium of Light in April - which culminated in 105 arrests - could have been lifted from the pages of any number of books, so are the new lumbering literati encouraging violence?

Pennant said: "The books don't glorify violence, that's a nonsense. Arrest figures at Upton Park aren't on the up but my book sales are increasing. There's no link. Everyone said that punk would turn the world into a version of Mad Max, but it didn't happen."

He's probably right. The mindless morons who could yet get England thrown out of Euro 2004 have never read a book in their lives.

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