Face (1997 film)

Face is a 1997 British crime thriller directed by Antonia Bird and written by Ronan Bennett, in which a close-knit gang of London professional thieves turns on one another after a meticulously planned heist yields far less money than expected. Robert Carlyle and Ray Winstone lead the cast, with Lena Headey, Philip Davis, Steven Waddington, Peter Vaughan, and the Blur frontman Damon Albarn in his first acting role.^{1 • 2}

Themes and political reading

Bennett's screenplay positions the film as a comment on Britain's post-Thatcherite materialist legacy. Ray is portrayed as a lapsed socialist who sees crime as an expression of individualism but hankers for the return of solidarity; his girlfriend Connie runs a halfway house and his mother is deeply committed to government protests.^{1 • 7} The BFI Southbank program notes describe a film that never pulls its punches about the social forces behind self-serving attitudes, yet never allows its strongly left-wing attitude to distract from the story.³

Bird herself framed the film through the East End community where she had lived for twenty years: "I wasn't trying to show them in a good light, but I was trying to say these are real people with real inner lives. They have the same emotional responses and needs as you or I."⁷

Place in British crime cinema

Released a year before Guy Ritchie's more pantomime-style Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels (1998), Face set out to be a credible look at London's underbelly, exploring the trickle-down effect of crime in the vein of The Long Good Friday (1980). Its contemporaries included the more cartoonish Shooting Fish (1997) and the gothic Captives (1994).²

Influences and echoes. The heist plot took cues from the 1983 Brink's-Mat robbery, while the mugshot-style poster art and the concept of bickering robbers point to Reservoir Dogs (1992) as a strong influence. The lovelorn-crook angle would later ring a bell for fans of Sexy Beast (2000).² The Empire review, published on 26 September 1997, judged that "the British crime thriller comes roaring back to life, earning a mention alongside such greats as The Long Good Friday and the brilliant Get Carter."⁴

Cast and production

Antonia Bird was a former resident director of the Royal Court Theatre who moved into television and film; her earlier features included the BBC film Safe (1993), which also starred Carlyle, and Priest (1994), a hit at the 1994 Toronto International Film Festival, where it won the People's Choice Award.^{2 • 7} She and Carlyle had wanted to work together, and the script from Ronan Bennett, the writer later known for Top Boy, arrived at a moment when both had a gap in their schedules.³

The full credited cast includes Robert Carlyle (Ray), Ray Winstone (Dave), Steven Waddington (Stevie), Philip Davis (Julian), Damon Albarn (Jason), Lena Headey (Connie), Peter Vaughan (Sonny), Sue Johnston (Alice), and Steve Sweeney (Weasel). Gerry Conlon, the real man wrongly imprisoned for the Guildford pub bombings and the subject of In the Name of the Father (1993), appears in a cameo as Vince.^{6 • 8 • 4} Behind the camera, Fred Tammes was cinematographer, St. John O'Rorke editor, and the score was credited to Paul Conboy, Adrian Corker, and Andy Roberts.⁶

Music

The film takes its soundtrack seriously, mixing Britpop, big beat, and nuanced rock choices, with a recurring joke in which the robbers play an £800 name-that-tune radio quiz. Casting Blur frontman Damon Albarn in his first acting role, as Jason, fits the film's Britpop-era setting.²

Release and reception

The BBFC classified the cinema version, running 105 minutes 11 seconds, on 14 August 1997 for distributor U.I.P. (UK). Home entertainment versions of about 101 minutes followed from CIC Video in 1998 and Paramount Home Entertainment (UK) in 2002.⁵ The film screened at the Melbourne International Film Festival in 1998.⁷ In Japan it opened theatrically on 19 December 1998.⁹

Critical response was broadly favorable. Time Out noted that after Bird's unhappy Hollywood venture Mad Love, the heist-gone-wrong picture reclaimed lost ground on home turf, praising Ronan Bennett's hard-boiled script, the excellent Carlyle, and a knockout cast, with a palpable sense of London in the dark days of winter.¹⁰ The BFI Southbank notes singled out Carlyle's performance, arguing that after The Full Monty (1997), Trainspotting (1995), and Hamish Macbeth, Face proved how charismatic he is as a heavyweight-drama lead.³ Empire was more reserved about the politics, finding the subtext too deliberate and the traitor-in-the-group device familiar, while conceding that the heist sequence is mounted with stunning ferocity.⁴

The BFI has since listed the film among its cult classics, calling it a stylish time-capsule from the Britpop era's wave of geezer cinema, and it remains available on BFI Player.^{2 • 1}

References

1. Face, BFI Player
2. Watch a cult classic #5: Face, BFI
3. Face, BFI Southbank Programme Notes
4. Face Review, Empire
5. Face, British Board of Film Classification
6. Face: Full Cast & Crew, Rotten Tomatoes
7. Face, MIFF Film Archive
8. Face, Full Cast & Crew, TV Guide
9. フェイス（1997）, 映画.com
10. Face 1997, directed by Antonia Bird, Time Out

Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 15, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026

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