A Very British Gangster

Charismatic and complicated, Noonan tries to run the movie the way he runs his town. But while the director sometimes appears to be glorifying Noonan's choices, reminders of uncomfortable reality intrude regularly.

Noonan's life is one few of us can comprehend, and Mac Intyre's documentary, A Very British Gangster, is like a Guy Ritchie film come to life, only with a better dressed cast.

Investigative journalist Donal MacIntyre's film is fairly standard British TV product, closer to a glorified "60 Minutes" segment then to cinematic art. But never mind -- its subject is, as he might say, feckin' amazing.

Noonan talks too much, preens too much and simply loves the camera. And the bald, bullish, real-life mobster will likely place MacIntyre's movie among the more commercial nonfiction films of the year.

A Very British Gangster is not only Noonan's story but a profile of a community dealing with poverty and drugs, and seeing no way out. In a sense, Noonan and his cronies are born into a life of crime.

MacIntyre's control over his material is assured at times, particularly when he focuses on Dom's young son, Bugsy, and the other troubled boys who float around the periphery of the Noonan gang.

Plays less like a documentary than an E! exposé of lowlife skulduggery.