3/10: Missinformative crap where editing and lead was the seeworthy bit

3:10

In short:
Unrealistic plotline with big plotholes. The seeworthy bits are the cinematography (which builds momentum quite well) and Stephen Graham (was sad to see him lending himself to this).
If you do not care for the realism of movies that are supposed to depict reality and like dark movies with an element of thrill this could be the movie for you.

In long (this is focused on the realism or not of the plot):
This movie has so many missinformative messages baked in:
One person shifts takes turn in a little station when in reality CCTV's are linked to a global network - meaning there isn't just one "hero" watchman that sits alone in a room watching out for crime but a surveillence network that has automatical facial recognition, number plate identification...

The real "Watchmen" most likely sits in cubicles (in UK some possibly in/near GCHQ) in large "factories" with hundreds to tens of thousands of employees (depending on nation). Not only that, several nations (Israel, USA and China up near the top) has active networks of similar sizes affecting social media networks, news commentary and the like to try and control the formal narrative (what people perceive is happening in the world) - spewing misstrust and hate towards the establishment for striving far away from reality (in the informal interest group meaning to muster support for actions taken in the dark).

What the watchman, if there is a local positioned person monitoring CCTV's for the local police, it's simply relaying information to the local police - even as such the person stands to have alot more intriquate tools than shown in the movie.
If UK is anyway near Sweden in organisatation all positions (more or less) will have been centralised (by a third party that also then has access to the feeds (on top of hardware manufactureres).
The information about this is neither unknown so that the minor criminals would not know that they would be screwed if they acted the way they did which makes the movie even more illogical (the whole premise simply cant hold water when you look at it)

The story simply draws human connotations and tries to draw emotional defense towards the thousands of positions of the "watchmen" that are a part of the problem when the establishment want to dictate realities through different means. Fascism (plutocracy) spreading fear and misstrust for people at it's "best", there are so many technologies and possibilities to bring economical criminals to justice for not doing their part - however as this technology it is not utilised for that as it should (the largest crimes first and smaller as you get a grip on crime).

Pro's
• Cinematography
• Momentum
• Stephen Graham

Con's
• Mostly missinformative
• Too large plotholes to ignore
• Seing that Stephen Graham is in it

End notes:
I was disparaged seing an actor I've seen more than a couple of handful of times doing brilliant supporting performances in this missinformation piece. Yes, it's (probably) a hard transition to go from supporting lead to lead but for me doing another movie like this will take him further away from the limelight as his popularity decreases.
It's been a while since Snatch and while a movie like that is not likely to come along again. For me, Graham excells at dancing on the border between bad and good - so a more serious UK crime/drama (despite the typecasting) should be his way to landing proper lead roles - then expanding from there.

Ignorance is only a bliss if you haven't reached awareness.
My imdb posts are getting altered.