Loosely based on a true story, director Jon S. Baird's Cass traces the evolution of one individual from an infant with slim prospects to one of the most respected and feared individuals in the United Kingdom. Nonso Alonzie stars as the title character, who begins life as a Jamaican baby bereft of his parents, but promptly witnesses his fate and future turn an unexpected corner with his adoption by an elderly Caucasian couple. Pummeled mercilessly and bullied with racist taunts as a boy, Cass
instinctively takes matters into his own hands and thus discovers a source of power and control, in violent action, that he never knew he possessed. Eventually, however, this path comes back to bite him via a assassination attempt against him, that is - mercifully - unsuccessful. In time, Cass reaches a fork in the road, and must choose between continuing to embrace the violence that has shaped and colored his life, or opting for more controlled and thoughtful approach to conflict. ~ Nathan Southern, Rovi
The film's repetitive structure never quite resolves into something we can properly engage with, especially when a somewhat heavy-handed message rears its head.
When Anozie isn't delivering a tired voiceover about honour on the terraces, we're treated to rubbish fights, feeble dialogue and mockney accents. Dreadful.
It is a bit better than many recent lipsmacking movies on similar subjects... but there's still the same self-serving, self-sentimentalising macho nonsense.
Inanimate dialogue and plodding pacing don't give the talented cast much to work with, and the camera is directed with all the grace of a pub brawl at closing time.
Cass has more heart than your average hooligan flick, but it's a clumsy, compromised film, hamstrung by its own redemptive structure and too infatuated with its protagonist to take an objective point of view.
Though the narrative is saggy and you feel there's nowhere left to go after the first hour, a much-needed dash of class from Jon S Baird's direction helps lift 'Cass' above its oft-reactionary genre brethren.
It may not be directed by Nick Love, but apart from the racial element, this could have easily have been one of Love's films. Whilst it's based on a true story, we have seen it all before, the racial qualities bring out the unique story for Cass being brought up by white parents, but all in all it's another story of
football violence.
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