The Irish Mob Review

Coming from first time director Patrick McKnight, The Irish Mob tells the story of gangland Dublin from the point of view of crime boss Val Fagan.

Needing to raise funds for a huge drug shipment, Fagan and his gang carry out a meticulously planned raid on a cash depot. The gang are having their every move watched by Garda detectives and this scrutiny increases and makes life difficult for Val.

With the release of grudge holding psychopathic criminal Decco from prison, Fagan’s life gets even more difficult and the cracks begin to appear in his criminal empire.

How Far is Val willing to go to keep his place at the head of the crime table, find out when The Irish Mob comes to digital courtesy of 101 Films, perfectly timed for St Patrick’s Day.

Watch the Trailer below

So, what’s it like?

The film has a low budget feel to it from the beginning, and it’s a pretty violent beginning.

The opening credits are very similar to a TV crime drama, with a sprinkle of Bond film, the theme tune is very Bond too.

The sets nod towards low budget, scenes of the Garda having meetings look a little bit like a corporate staff training video and during the raid you wonder if it’s just the same office with a different piece of paper on the door.

The narration by Val (Rob McCarthy) sets the scene nicely and he speaks clearly with a fairly thick Irish accent to my non Irish ears.

The accents caused me a bit of an issue at the beginning of the film due to the sound editing on dialogue being slightly “roomy”. The faster talking cast members had me struggling, I popped the CC automated subtitles on the screener I watched and they struggled too.

As the film progressed I found this less of an issue though and the sound improved in places, but room scenes still seemed to have an overall hollow sound to the dialogue.

The film looks good for the most part, really nicely shot overall and some of the scenes look great especially the low light scenes which look particularly cinematic.

The cast are all good, and the script for the most part keeps the film on track. Some of the scenes where Detective Delahunt is talking to her boss are slightly nonsensical as he keeps giving her funding, then taking it away. I think he needs sacking myself.

From the start of this film I thought I was going to struggle to watch it but as the film progressed I became fully engrossed and by the end I was genuinely worried for one of the characters so the tension building is clearly done very well.

Go into this accepting it’s a low budget film and you’ll be pleasantly surprised.

With uncompromising action, vicious violence and dangerous dealings the 120 minute runtime flys by.

Perfect viewing for St Patrick’s Day.