Offender (2012)

Joe Cole play's Tommy, a 20 year old who keeps on the straight an narrow, decent job as a labourer working hard to support his loving girlfriend who is expecting, his whole life is destroyed when his girlfriend is brutally attacked by a gang, he has one thing on his mind when he loses everything...vengeance.

The film has obvious shades of the classic Brit yoof prison flick "Scum", but this is no poor mans copy, Cole is excellent as Tommy, the plot isn't bogged down in cliché, the violence simmers, this is no film with a happy ending, shades of 'Shawshank' redemption with the aforementioned "Scum" hard hitting  reality of a young offenders institution.

A surprisingly mature film.

*****