Kidulthood

Noel Clarke and Menhaj Huda’s explosive youth film follows the drug, sex and crime-fuelled antics of a group of West London teens over the course of a single day.

Noel Clarke and Menhaj Huda breathed new life into the urban youth story with their explosive 2005 film, which influenced an entire cycle of gritty London-set sagas. Charting the disreputable conduct of a disenfranchised, racially mixed group of West London teens over the course of a single day, Kidulthood manages to encompass a torrent of tabloid-baiting issues into one narrative, including pregnancy, drugs, gun crime, pregnancy, prostitution, bullying and suicide.

But Clarke’s funny and witty script transcends any hint of soap-opera melodramatics, while Huda keeps events rolling at a cracking pace. An ensemble cast of young talents would go on to further successes (Rafe Spall, Jaime Winstone), but it was Clarke himself who really made a name for himself, establishing his own cinematic brand with the two subsequent ‘hood sequels which he directed himself.