20 Underrated Movies From 2000 You've Probably Never Seen

5. Gangster No. 1

Released: 9th June 2000 (UK)

With the likes of Snatch and Sexy Beast, 2000 was very much the peak of the post-Lock, Stock And Two Smoking Barrels era of British gangster film. This punchy, retro example of the genre may have only made a matter of tens of thousands at the box office, but is deserving of mention in the same breath as those bigger hitters.

Adapted from a play by Sexy Beast writers Louis Mellis and David Scinto, Gangster No. 1 is the story of the rise of a gangster in swinging sixties London, framed by a present day narrative of the gangster learning of his former mentor-turned-rival's release from prison.

Former photographer Paul McGuigan, these days best known for his work as director on TV shows like Sherlock, makes this a slick, visually stylish and brutally violent genre exercise, but the movie is chiefly worth revisiting for the twin central performances as the titular gangster across the movie's two time periods.

As the ageing crimelord version, Malcolm McDowell is in full-Clockwork Orange unhinged psycho mode, but it is Paul Bettany as his younger self who really steals the show. A chillingly vicious, cold-hearted, ambitious sociopath Bettany's gangster is every bit as compellingly monstrous as any of the gangster movie greats.