Bigga than Ben: a Guide to Ripping Off London

SYNOPSIS

Barbed laughs in the Borat mould make for brisk and boisterously un-PC entertainment in writer/director Suzie Halewood's low-budget satire. Based on the controversial diaries of Russian immigrants Pavel Tetersky and Sergei Sakin, it's a loosely plotted travelogue in which two self-confessed "pieces of Moscow scum" (played by Russian heart-throb Andrei Chadov and Ben Barnes from The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian) dodge conscription and flee to London, intent on scamming their way to a fortune. What follows is an outrageous yet frequently hilarious rough guide to exploiting the system, peppered with the émigrés's abrasive and racially stereotypical observations on multicultural British life. Chadov and a scene-stealing Barnes are a surprisingly likeable pairing, despite their despicable antics and occasionally indecipherable accents. But when events take a serious turn, the picture loses its vitality, limping to its conclusion in a mess of incongruous sentiment and heavy-handed moralising.