Lethal Impact: GBH 2 (1991)

The last completed film of Cliff Twemlow, Lethal Impact: GBH 2 (1991) is, as the title implies, a direct sequel to his first feature, GBH (1983), with Twemlow (billed as 'Mike Sullivan', in common with a number of his later productions), returning as club bouncer extraordinaire Steve Donovan.  The character's apparent demise at the end of the earlier film is brushed aside with a passing reference, mid-way through the running time, to the police marksmen having missed him.  Rather than being six feet under, it seems that Donovan has spent the intervening eight years living in Malta, where we find him early in the film.  He quickly finds himself drawn back to Manchester, with former adversary Keller informing him that Donovan's teenaged niece has been drawn into the world of child pornography, appearing in an illicit video.  Keller has his own motivations for wanting Donovan back in Manchester - the same gang behind the child porn videos are also threatening his club.  Back home, Donovan finds the situation has gotten worse - his niece has committed suicide.  Naturally, Donovan goes on a lengthy rampage, tracking down those who made the video and violently disposing of every one of them.  He then expands his vengeance by taking out the gang of women used by the gang to recruit victims by luring them into a van, before working his way through the ranks of the entire gang.  People have shotguns fired up their backsides, ('How's that for a blow-job, boys?'), are blown up, burned to death and even decapitated after their tie is trapped in a descending lift's door.  Beatings and gunfights proliferate and the bodies pile up, attracting the attention of the police, although the Inspector in charge of the case isn't unsympathetic to Donovan's crusade as the death toll amongst gang members and peadophiles racks up.

As is the case with sequels, Lethal Impact is very much GBH, but bigger, with more fights, more guns and more of the sleazy side of Manchester's club scene.  Even Donovan's sidekick Chris, played by Brett Sinclair, turns up again - only to end up gravely ill in a hospital bed again, (although this time we at least see him make a recovery).  The difference is that this time around, it is all far darker, driven by the peadophile plot, (which encompasses every of the tabloids' contemporary 'peado panic' tropes - Donovan even finds time to deal with a peado priest), with the humour toned down and a dour atmosphere.  This version of Donovan, driven purely by revenge, spouting self-righteous justifications involving protecting children, for his bloody killing spree, feels far less sympathetic and Twemlow's natural charisma, abundantly evident in the first film, only shines through intermittently.  The film is also decidedly overlong, lacking the original's snappy pace, with the litany of killings eventually feeling repetitive.  On the plus side, bearing in mind the film's meagre resources, the fight scenes are well staged, as is the rest of the action.  Indeed, overall, Twemlow regular David Kent-Watson's direction is efficient, if unspectacular, handling the cast and locations effectively, with the streets, bars, clubs and hotels of Manchester giving the movie a feel of raw authenticity.  But even these virtues can't hide a certain air of desperation permeating the film.

There's no doubt that Lethal Impact represented one last roll of the dice for Twemlow.  Finding financing for his films was becoming more difficult, with several of his projects not progressing beyond demo reels.  To get Lethal Impact into production, Twemlow reportedly had to secure financing from some very dodgy Manchester clubland figures, which left some of the cast and crew uneasy.  The film also cannibalised one of those unrealised projects for the peadophile plot line, which feels very much as if it has been inserted into a straight gangster story, sitting somewhat uncomfortably with the gangster elements.  As with several of his other films, though, Twemlow was able to secure the services of a better known, mainstream, actor in a supporting role, in this case Terrence Hardiman, who plays Donovan's bereaved brother, Bill.  With a shorter running time, more humour and the peadophile and gangland aspects of its script better integrated, Lethal Impact would, undoubtedly, have been a far stronger film, much more in the mould of GBH.  As it stands, it is still intermittently enjoyable, but not as exhilarating an experience as the first film, which revelled in its lack of resources and rough edges.  Ironically, it is the greater slickness of Lethal Impact, the result not just of a better budget, but also the increased film-making experience of Twemlow and his crew, which makes it a less interesting film than its predecessor.  Not only did GBH have a certain novelty value, a perfect post-pub direct-to-video movie that had  seemingly come out of nowhere, it was its sheer roughness and gritty feel that gave it a distinctive feel.  Morever, the sheer enthusiasm of its makers comes through the screen, with the whole enterprise imbued with their joi de vivre.  The sequel, by contrast, feels more solemn, perhaps even a little jaded.  Still, it's always good to see Cliff Twemlow doing his stuff on screen - he might not have been the world's (or even Manchester's) greatest actor, but he had genuine screen presence and the sort of energy that could carry an entire film.  It seems fitting that his time as a low-budget filmmaker should have come full circle, beginning and ending with Steve Donovan.  Although the film ends apocalyptically, with a wedding massacre in which everyone seems to have been mown down in a hail of bullets, the end credits still promise us another sequel.  Sadly, though, it wasn't to be as, within a couple of years of Lethal Impact's debut, (in a club owned by one of those dodgy financial backers), Twemlow was dead at the age of 55.