South West 9 (DVD 2003)

This film ambitiously packs in a sizeable raft of ideas as Parry not only rushes through club culture, corporate life, politics, and the church, but also focuses on the lives of five individuals across a manic 24 hours. He also supplies the often sparky narration.

The five include: a small-time drug-dealer who knows failure; an unhinged addict with barely the tiniest grip on reality; a black female professional with a valuable CD-ROM that is stolen; a white Rastafarian who is happy in her hypocrisy (she regularly sneaks off to stay with her middle-class parents); and an eager black youngster who, while immersed in an ever-changing Brixton, also keeps a cautious distance from it.

Certainly this rag-bag of characters, who are at least distinctive, look and sound the part, just like the film itself. Unfortunately, though, since Parry is desperate to leave no corner of Brixton untouched, almost everything is reduced to the status of snippet, a bit of drug-dealing here, a shot of the search for the missing disc there. Most irritating is the fact that, just as a particular dramatic thread is being woven into the piece, a character will suddenly vanish, only to reappear some time later, as if the actor just remembered he had a scene to do. The flavour of real life, not great film making.