Twenty-seven-year-old Birmingham-born director Sheikh Shahnawaz makes an impression with his macho low-budget debut about an undercover cop. It is a crime drama with two teaspoons of Guy Richie, a tablespoon of Line of Duty and a dollop of sentimental social-realism chucked in at end. It’s not without flaws but Shahnawaz is clearly ambitious and does well on what looks like a minuscule budget.
Gurj Gill plays Danny, a Met detective recruited for an undercover operation: posing as an addict to sniff out major crack and heroin dealers. The chief constable, concerned about police corruption, keeps the job hush-hush, strictly between the two of them. (The film is jam-packed with implausibilities like this. If Danny’s job is off the books, who’s paying for it? Would a cop really go undercover as a bottom-rung addict to infiltrate a supply chain?)
