I recall watching Kidulthood and coming away from it with no real like/dislike for it. It was an enjoyable film which attempted to hold a mirror up to youth culture in London. Some criticised it for being over sensationalised and not a true reflection but I have no first hand experience so couldn't comment.It was, therefore, not high on my list of priorities to watch Adulthood. The thought of spending more time with the characters did not fill me with any feelings of joy. However I was very happily surprised at what a well crafted, produced and presented film this is.The story picks up 6 years after Kidulthood. Sam has been released from prison and is almost instantly attacked. A threat is made against him and his family and he has to take action to find the source and put a stop to it.The first point to note is that there is no need for you to have seen Kidulthood. Clearly you will enjoy the film on a different level if you have seen it as what develops are a number of scenes which focus on the impact Sams attitude and actions in the first film have had on the people around him.The story develops at a perfect pace. We get to see more depth to the characters and understand the pain that they have suffered and continue to suffer. Sams brother, for example, is on the same track as his brother was and this is down to the "legacy" of being related. Jay has turned into a petty thief and drug dealer and seems destined to crash and burn. We see how it has affected Sams mother, his ex and all (well, nearly all) of the central characters from the first film. The ripples of this one incident are clearly being felt this long after the event, ripples that will continue indefinitely.At the heart of the film are two outstanding performances. The first, from Noel Clark (who also wrote and directed) is slow burning, poignant and extremely powerful. His experiences and the impact of the killing develop in the form of flashbacks, very little is actually said but we learn enough to know that if ever anyone regretted their actions it is Sam. The final scenes with Jay are heart wrenching, as is the one where Lexi is trying to comfort him in her flat.Noel Clark plays the part brilliantly. He fully deserves all of the plaudits and recognition he received. Here is a character who I really did not care for in the first film. After watching Adulthood, however, I feel for him. I don't like him - you don't forget what his character did or that he is not a good person but you do empathise with him and the situation he finds himself in. It had to be a performance that balanced the regretfulness and showed the distance he had come but with the knowledge of his previous life and that strong elements of this remained. It could have been all brooding and moody or all anger and fury but the skillful performance found a perfect middle ground.Second is Scarlett Johnsons performance. Her role is central to the plot and she is given time to really develop the character. The scene where she is leaving the message on Sams phone is heartbreaking. Knowing that she and Sam have similar issues and experiences gives us hope that there may be a happy ending for both of them. She is a damaged person trying to come to terms with the rape. She is struggling but sees in Sam redemption, someone who understands her sufferings and someone who can (possibly) help her.Again, the focus could have been purely on the damage caused but the performance given shows the humanistic elements of the character. The hardness which slowly breaks down when she finds someone she can be vulnerable with. Like I said before, it is heartbreaking.The supporting cast are, also, perfect. The final scene between Sam and Jay is brilliantly shot (apart from the Matrix moment halfway through!) and brilliantly acted. Again, you can see the very real pain Jay is suffering; pain that cuts to his very core.All this is not to say the film isn't without flaw. I found the whole set up of the dealers extremely convoluted and unlikely. I also found myself getting agitated at the slang being used. I accept that this is the language used but some of the characters slipped in and out of it too easily.Small concerns, however, in a film that shows that you can have a simple but strong story, some superb young actors and still have a great film without the need for big bucks or Hollywood. Congratulations Mickey The Idiot, the Doctor would be proud! 8.5/10

Adulthood is the first English-language film I've ever had to watch with subtitles because I couldn't understand what the characters were saying. Almost without exception the young actors speak a strangulated version of the language through a Caribbean-affected drawl that makes every other word unintelligible. Americans – who I've seen in other film's reviews commenting on the difficulty of following, say, a cockney accent (which British people can easily understand) – won't have a hope of figuring out what they are talking about.Happily, that's pretty much the only complaint (although it's an observation rather than a complaint) as Noel Clarke has delivered a powerful sequel to his highly acclaimed Kidulthood. I hadn't seen that film when I saw this, but it isn't really necessary in order to understand what is going on. Clarke plays a young man on his first day out of prison who finds himself the target of the friend of the youth he killed six years before. His character, eyes opened by a spell in prison that has shown him how deluded he was before he went inside when he considered himself to be a big man, is played low-key, in contrast to those of all the other youths, including the small-time dealer, a friend of Clarke's victim, who puts a contract out on him.Clarke gets under the skin of these characters without forcing them to step outside of their tough shells to blurt out insightful speeches. The dealer's insecurity is evident in the exaggerated swagger, the habitual aggression that constantly threatens to boil over into violence or rage. Like an old man he is resistant to change and fearful of losing more friends – even if it's to an education and a woman who isn't fazed by his in-your-face attitude. Adam Deacon nails the part perfectly and easily gives the best performance in a film which is marked by the quality of the acting.Everyone else is looking for a way out of the gloomy inner-city jungle while ensuring, by the nature of their activities, that they will never leave. Clarke's wrapping up of the story offers no solutions or fake happy endings: 'This isn't over,' the defeated Jay cries, and his words refer as much to the character's entrapment in their dispiriting urban prison as it does to his feud with Clarke

Originally just the writer of the first film, Kidulthood, Doctor Who's Noel Clarke also takes the director's chair for this sequel to the hit teenage social drama film. Basically, it has been six years since he killed Trife, and released from prison, Sam Peel (Clarke) can't escape the life he now doesn't want to live anymore. Jay (Dead Set's Adam Deacon), a friend of Trife, wants to get revenge on Sam so much that he is prepared to have him killed. Sam is trying to get the message across to all after him that he no longer wants to create violence, and that he didn't mean to kill Trife. Lexi (EastEnders' Scarlett Alice Johnson) is one of the only people on his side and trying to help him, but at the same time, she is willing to double cross to get what she wants, i.e. drugs. In the end, Sam and Jay confront each other, Jay with a gun and Sam with a baseball bat, and even though Jay can't face killing him, and Sam has tried to give his peace, Jay warns him that it isn't over. Also starring Jacob Anderson as Omen, Ben Drew as Dabs, Danny Dyer as Hayden, Kidulthood's Femi Oyeniran as Moony, Shanika Warren-Markland as Kayla, Kidulthood's Red Madrell as Alisa, Nathan Constance as Ike, Lenny Henry in Pieces' Cornell John as Uncle Curtis and Don Klass as Blammy. Clarke deservedly won the BAFTA for Best Rising Star, he directs the film with great skill. It is a shame not all the same cast could come back, e.g. Jaime Winstone (Ray's daughter) and Rafe Spall (Timothy's son), but it is a great sequel none-the-less. Good!

I was excited to watch this film, I saw Kidulthood when it first came out in 2006 and it wasn't very popular then. I think that anyone who is considering going watching Adulthood without having already seen Kidulthood should think again. The whole plot revolves around what happened in the first film.Anybody who has seen both films should agree that Kidulthood is the better of the two. The storyline is clearer and easier to follow and it is not as dark or as serious as Adulthood until the very end. However Adulthood is an amazing film with an excellent performance from Noel Clarke as a director and an actor. Even though I don't think that Adulthood lived up to its predecessor, It is definitely worth a watch.I think that Adam Deacon steals the show, as he did in Kidulthood and I like how the film shows how peoples lives can change as a result of an event such as the death of Trife in the first film. For example, Jay is clearly affected more by the death of his friend and he turns to dealing drugs and theft whereas Mooney (or Robert) goes to University and studies law.I love the concept of both films and could watch either of them over and over.