The British Tough Guy Trope, Explained

this video is brought to you by Squarespace no I've got a wife and kids please don't shoot me what's that mate don't shoot you how about do shoot you oh no no no 5:30 nice just in time for the footy the British Hardman archetype is one of the most popular characters in television and film and it completely broke the classical stereotype of your average British man I'm certainly not part of the aristocracy that's definitely true I'm a man of the people Vox popular Vox day from Alfie to James Bond Ross Kemp to Danny Dy today we will explore the incredible and sometimes controversial evolution of the British har quite all right wasn't think no more about it one never thinks to question him I don't discuss my private life with strangers for the most part in British history the understanding of a British male was extremely inaccurate it' always be this very Posh upper class man a gentleman kind intelligent sophisticated how long have you been with a the police department just your sir before that I was a sergeant in the Marines good day gentlemen early British Cinema would have had you believe that every British person spoke and acted like this however I've probably met in my life three people that perhaps speak like this as opposed to thousands of people that speak like this got some bad news for you John what the let's have it Phil what's the matter your bottle going there you cross the line Alfie you [ __ ] cross the line the LA but before we can get into people like Ross Kemp before we can talk about Danny Dy Tom Hardy Killian Murphy there was one very important man in Breaking this stereotype of British men I admire your luck Mr Bond James Bond James Bond James Bond came around in 1962 with a film called doctor no and this film was pretty controversial the Vatican came out and said this is a dangerous mixture of violence vulgarity sadism and sex in the early 1900s TV and film was seen by the general public and the government as a sort of dangerous art form it was it was seen with a lot of fear the bbfc was established and in 1934 the haze code was established in Hollywood basically to stop the government breathing down the film industry's neck they made a bunch of self-imposed rules of what you can and can't do or say in a movie and so class if we open our Hayes code guideline book and we turn to the chapter of be careful on number 12 we will see sympathy for criminals and what this led to was that the main character in most films would always be an an upper class person who was very morally righteous who was a gentleman well-mannered and you would never really see a main character who was a criminal and if he was a criminal it'd be very obvious that the film was trying to tell you don't be like him Little Billy or bad things will happen to you and so James Bond was very interesting because he twisted the archetype sure he was a good guy you know he fought for the British government and all things good and proper but he did so in morally questionable ways like murdering people and so this would lay the foundations for what was to come before we go further with this video I want to give a massive shout out to today's sponsor Squarespace Squarespace is the number one platform for building your very own beautiful looking website you need to have a good website these days if you're trying to compete in the market and Squarespace takes this whole process makes it very easy and actually fun there's tons of templates that you can pick customize and perfectly match your brand and what it is you do whether you're a PT or a graphic designer a brand owner or whatever really Squarespace will make you a perfect website as well there's tons of built-in tools like email marketing appointment scheduling e-commerce that will just elevate your business to that next level I've been using Squarespace myself and I must say it's really easy it's very fun so be sure to check out squarespace.com Jim the Giant and to get 10% off your first purchase of a website or a domain use the code Jimmy the giant anyway back to the video you want to wait till the game or do you want to make one with me now don't punch above your weight you long streak of piss well stop punching your old woman about then W say you f what is a Giza it's probably worth me I talk about him a lot it's probably worth me explaining it clearly AA is someone from like in and around London he talks a little like this in a dialect known as cotney Ry and slang Sharon who's that on the Dog and Bone say that again mate you must be having a bubble [ __ ] hell Bill I near he fell down the apples and pear the other day yeah he was Rudee he was Brash you know he wasn't afraid to speak his mind you know he wasn't the reserved gentleman who would keep poised and calm no Barry b they let you know what they thought mate you know he loves the pub he loves his Julie he hates foreigners and if he isn't obvious he's a very workingclass boy and he's he's [ __ ] proud of it mate but the one thing that is the most important about the gizer is that he not only loves but his life orbits around [Applause] football fing you football culture in the 70s and 80s is very important in the creation of the British hard man I made a whole video on hooliganism but basically it was this big deal around this era British Society had become very scared of these football fans who were literally killing each other over over the sport England was banned from playing football in Europe because of how violent our fans were there were these major disasters the British public the government the newspapers pretty much the whole world hated and feared football holigans but then we pointed a camera at them and all of a sudden we l them I told you I just got to have in this is what it's all about it's what we live for I'm just have a bored M approaching 30 in a dead end job who lives for the weekend films about football hooliganism was just everywhere you couldn't escape them in 1988 the film The Firm came out ID came out in 1995 there was this entire wave of these gritty films that focused on the the underbelly of football hooliganism and it really opened up the interest for a new type of British tough guy keep killing it's not worth it he bu him a new jums down the path I give a toss about that they shove their fing job you wouldn't see the GE with a martini and driving at Aston Martin you'd see him with a can of Stella ragging it around in a BMW 3 Series and so by the late 1900s Cinema had gone through the American new wave and British New Wave this era basically undid what the bbfc and the haze code originally set out to do now it was common to see main characters who were from workingclass backgrounds and even it was now very common to see films focusing on bad guys as main characters and so all of this brings us to a very important film in the time timeline of The Hard Man and that is Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels you have a better idea how to get 500,000 in the next few days let us know guy Richie released this absolute ther of a film it was a banger this was the boy's first film just imagine your first anything your first kiss your first I don't know [ __ ] was probably not that good critical Acclaim worldwide success Awards yeah yeah yeah we get it the film was good but most importantly for our beloved Giza this was their moment some bad news for you John what the mind your language in front of the boy Vinnie Jones he was a professional football player in real life he was he was more known for his fouls than his football abilities if you search on YouTube his name the first thing that comes up is his fouls Montage well that's Bing how how can you defend Martin like yeah he was a decent football player but people mainly went to watch him to see if this was the week he'd finally get banned from the sport and eventually he did Guy Richie casted Vinnie Jones for the role of big Chris in lockstock and 2 smoking bouns having not acted like that before guy Richie knew that Vinnie Jones would be the perfect person for this role you're having second fults you're shrinking and your two little balls are shrinking with you hello yes this is the agent for Vinnie Jones what's that you want us to film naughty football boys 19 ah no we got bang bang lock and loaded for blood never dries being filmed in November sorry we were starting to see more and more characters like this popping up all around Cinema on TV but as good as all of this was and as convincing as as it was James Bond isn't a real person really drinking martinis and shooting Russians big Chris isn't a real person shaking down detas with a car door all of these things that we have talked about have taken place in the Fantastical world of fiction but it would only be a matter of time before fiction would meet reality I'm Danny D playing Hardman and acting tough as been my bread and butter but now I've got a new role I'm going to be tracking down some of the most feared men in the country so during this era of like fetishizing football violence Vinnie Jones had actually appeared in a documentary in 1992 called soccer Hard Men I mean what is hard is it is hard not flinching in a tackle I think that's what it means and I think this documentary gave the inspiration for a new style of documentary Making which we will call the British Hardman documentary era I know how did I come up with that but it would be in 2004 where we would really see The Hard Man Documentary come into full fluish as an actor I've played various is Hard Men but now I was in search of the real thing I was on a mission to meet one of the most violent gangs in the world Rio's notorious street gangs you had Ross Kim having waps pointed at him are you going to kill me sh down no you going to kill me no kill me Danny D being scared of everything I thought it was time to leave as I realized I was dealing with some dangerous people Vinnie Jones rolling around with a feds BR [ __ ] a new meta was discovered whereby you take a Geer you put him in a dicey situation you point a camera at him you would get cash or wer as they would say these documentaries were insane Ross Kemp was known for his television role in East Enders playing a London hard man called Grant Mitchell I'm the psycho were you the blat with a gun threatening to shoot people not people Grant you it didn't really matter that this was a character and Ross was actually quite well spoken in real life I'm incredibly lucky to do something that I feel so passionate about you you can say what you want about Ross Kemp like his dad was a police officer he was a theater kid but you cannot pretend that Ross Kemp wasn't an absolute madman said we heard ion chat again now we got wizard going over so we're taking incoming boys he was literally in Afghanistan in in combat situations with a cameraman talking to the camera the footage that he got in Afghanistan was some of the best journalistic coverage of that as well he would meet with gang members in not only London where he was somewhat safe but in various parts of the world where it was just him and a cameraman and maybe a producer and a sound guy what about what about regretting what you've done to the girl I also do regret about it cuz if she fell pregnant what what will be that baby's father who will be that baby's father but what about her personal feelings it's simple you know you know he genuinely put himself in incredibly dangerous situ situations in very dangerous countries but as well as having this demeanor of being a tough guy very confident he could handle himself in any situation he never showed weakness he was never so tough that it seemed fake and put on he would often show his compassion and empathy to complicated issues why people are in these situations if one of your family's been hurt one me one my boys died but that was something to do with something El but it was still someone getting stabbed or whatever still violent in it but yeah it affected me a it but well how is he not going of course he affects you a lot of people R has been dying recently like and everyone knows who it is obviously but we just have to get along with it every day in it and he would even talk about how in some situations he was scared and [ __ ] himself but he just had to act in a tough way in order to not get killed that was absolutely for real that was not in any way set up God no no well I mean you tell I'm trying to pretend it's not happening if I was if I said it up I'd be far more mat I'd be a bit more like Mitchell I'm going please don't do that but as well he was even able to laugh at himself in the extras where he parody the fact that he's a fake tough guy are you hard no no you're not do you know what really hard is beating me up in that he was a multi-layered complex person who was incredible at not only acting but genuinely good at journalism and then you had Danny Dyer all right son pleasure to meet you brother pleasure to meet you son this is your Bozer then yeah I me are you sure we're going to walk in this Bo we're going to end up getting ironed out by this little you know what I mean but you seem sweet as but his early days yet you know what I mean I'm sure someone's going to Glass me joking got a naughty little firm but no not not many firms I've suppos FS up here know about you but you know you're almost like in a background you know what I mean no can you say that right we can go down on and turn you over Danny Dyer was none of that stuff all the good stuff I said he was none of it after appearing in football Factory Danny Dyer I think got stuck in a character role where he pretended to be a hard man but thought in real life he was now now a hard man and he created a hard man documentary with footb the real football factories in 2006 the only way I could describe it is like Danny Dy is an AI bot that's programmed to say as many Cockney rhyme and slang words in one sentence as possible been much tougher for the firms and all that what with the old CC TV and the old bill and all that have you got your nut R now all the while being clearly out of his depth when he was around anyone who was a real actual Geer incredibly weak ability at interviewing you would always just assume bad people were bad because they were bad you didn't watch his shows for the the journalism of Ross Kemp but you you more so watched it to see Danny Dy struggle in social situations you either like to hold your hands up or you don't it's just just you're born with it a you course you're born with it and that's what it's about you know what I mean if you Ain if you ain't doing it on The Terraces you're going to be doing it somewhere else it's just that violent streak no it's not a violent streak he being proud the British hard man was in its golden era in the '90s and 2000s it was everywhere we loved it we couldn't stop watching them oh hey little Billy how was school you want to go watch Toy Story too [ __ ] off Dad you prick I want to watch Elijah Wood and a guy who can hardly do a cotney accent and for sake stop saying soccer have a proper mix up over some footy is that all right all right Billy let's going into him you see slowly into the 2010s we would start to see a decline in these football hooligan films the hype around both football hooligan films and like The Hard Man Documentary format was becoming less and less common and that's because football hooliganism as a public issue and a moral panic in society was dwindling and so into the 2010s we were worried about new things weird men on bath salts wearing clown suits and eating Tide Pods and the world was starting to move on to a new British tough guy nothing what he stole my strap fam no I didn't I just told you you're chatting [ __ ] he Ain steal nothing now what is sh shut up [ __ ] D the interest for the British hard man and football hooliganism was traded out for the road man and UK drill The Hard Man was being thrown to the side like Woody when Andy got his new Buzz Lightyear toy and as well in the real world when you picture a tough guy who's British the football hard man Giza is kind of less common now they of course still exist but most of them are now in their 50s they they live in the clds they drive a range Ro watch Jeremy Clarkson and read the sun whilst the young men of today who are Rough and Ready they're probably more likely to talk like Road men as opposed to like the Cockney gazer it's a no it's not rolling pin who are you Fanny crra what you going to do with that you're going to bake me a cake sing me a song watch me black candles but look I I don't want to pretend that the hard man has disappeared it hasn't at all that's not the point I'm making in fact it's now just become so mainstream it's such an accepted role and Arch type in cinema and film that has become one of the default characters you would go to when you want to portray a tough guy like sure the Golden Era of the football hoodigan ISM and TV Hardman documentary era has passed but with actors like Jason Stam Tom Hardy and of course now Killian Murphy who's dominated and he actually introduced a new type of tough guy through the role of Thomas Shelby in peaky blindness he showed that British people can actually exist outside of London no fighting and everyone loves kilan Murphy doing the cool calm Sigma male edited with some hip-hop beat you cross the line Alfie you cross the line the line they usy my boy the British Hardman took the Notions of what it meant to be British and what a tough guy from England can look like and depicted it in a very gritty downto Earth and much more real way like what a real real tough guy from England would probably behave like I really think why the British Hardman was so successful was because of the ju position it created the mental image that most people have of what British people are like being contrasted with that of the British Hardman it pushed boundaries it bent the rules and ultimately they just prettying cool and I think slowly now in 2024 the world is starting to realize that England isn't Harry Potter I'm just waiting for Luton the movie to come out and then you guys will really understand why we complain about this place if you enjoyed that I'd love you to join my research team over on Twitch we go live on 3 p.m. Wednesdays but also various times you can check my community tab peace

Channel: JimmyTheGiant

Views: 189,966

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Id: AxXHo8eaDyg

Length: 18min 43sec (1123 seconds)

Published: Fri Jan 26 2024