Another documentary on the "hard men" of Britain from Gangster Videos The Krays: Geordie Connection. and Mad Frank: Britain's Most Dangerous Criminal!), Roy Shaw: Brute Force is just as objectionable as its sister documentaries.

Director Liam Galvin gives us an inside glimpse into the psychology (and psychosis) of truly frightening boxer/criminal Roy Shaw. Now considered a folk hero, in reality Shaw was a small time criminal who happened to be alive during the Kray brothers' reign of terror, and who now benefits from that incomprehensible nostalgia for those criminals and their times.

Fellow gangster Dave Courtney says that Roy Shaw was "born naughty; born to fight." That's believable, once you see the absolute unhinged look in Shaw's eyes as he mumbles incoherently about his various violent exploits. The documentary makes a point of trying to explain away Shaw's psychotic nature by suggesting childhood bullying and the loss of his father at an early age made him the way he was (a lot of people go through the same thing, and they don't wind up in prison). It's a facile proposition that's abandoned in favor of many shots of Shaw going on about how he whacked this guy and that guy. Shaw was an unlicensed boxer noted more for his ferocity in the ring than for any skill, and who committed crimes on the side that put him in over 22 prisons during his lifetime. A history of mental illness (including sessions of electroshock therapy), coupled with a career based on aggression and criminal activity, crippled any chances Shaw had of moving into legal, professional sports. Today, he enjoys widespread fame in England, where he wrote a bestselling book, while making personal appearances and endorsing products.

Roy Shaw: Brute Force is a very thin documentary on a marginal British criminal; based on the version of his life told here, he doesn't seem to qualify as a gangster. So it's difficult to justify the existence of this documentary in the "gangster videos" canon. It offers no real exploration of Shaw's psyche, nor does it paint a vivid portrait of the times and society that Shaw occupied during his heyday. It's little more than endless, tilted-frame shots of Shaw as he mumbles quite incoherently, while those bright, frightening eyes stare unblinkingly at the viewer. There's a few lines of narration throughout the DVD, but more would have been helpful to root the viewer to some kind of framework, instead of setting the viewer adrift in random sequences of confusing exposition.

The DVD:

The Video:
Roy Shaw: Brute Force is shot in the same "Gangstervision" process that the other above-mentioned documentaries are; it's a phony "process" consisting of bad lighting, fake shutter flutter, cheap video and arbitrary, jump-cut editing that tries to distract the viewer from the essential emptiness of the subject matter. While not as distracting as The Krays: Geordie Connection, "Gangstervision" still looks pretty silly.

The Audio:
Roy Shaw, at least to these American ears, is almost incomprehensible. He mumbles, trips over his words, and his accent is thick. Subtitles or closed captioning would have helped, but evidently, that wasn't considered for the American market of this DVD. The scary music they play over Shaw sometimes is kind of funny, though.

The Extras:
There are extras on Roy Shaw: Brute Force, but again, as with the other Gangster Videos releases, they're protracted and pointless. A Tribute to Tony Lambrianou gives us over an hour of tedious funeral footage of "Kray legend" Tony Lambrianou. To each his own. The disc problems on The Krays: Geordie Connection continue here in the extras with the Charles Bronson (the British criminal, not the actor) segment not working on any of my players. It just switched back to the main menu. Till Death Do Us Part also didn't play fully, but it appeared to be another tribute to Tony Lambrianou. Bad Boy Bash with boxer Earnie Shavers, makes almost no sense; it doesn't seem to belong in this collection. And there's a trailer for gangster Dave Courtney's Dodgy DVD -- no thanks. There's no explanations or context for any of these segments (the ones that play, at least), and it's hard to determine who would be interested in them, unless you're very familiar with all the players.

Final Thoughts:
Roy Shaw: Brute Force feels like filler to keep Gangster Videos in product. Shaw may be famous at home (more for being a boxer than a criminal), and he may enjoy re-enacting stabbings he committed in prison for the cameras, but here in America...unless you're really into real-life British criminals, skip it.