Original subtitles

Well, I can think of easier ways to pass your driving test.

And talking of passing tests, today Britain's most qualified criminal was

released from Wandsworth Prison. While serving his sentence, he's gained a

staggering 428 educational qualifications, including 147 O -levels,

-levels, and he's acquired a Liverpool accent.

He's a trained hairdresser, has 19 BSc's, 8 BA's, an MA and 4 PhD's, and

been awarded a gold medal by the Académie Française for his contributions

new cuisine.

And who should this egghead be but none other than one of the notorious Moss

brothers, Karl Moss, who, along with his brother Sterling, pursued a joint reign

of terror in northeast London gangland in the mid -70s. They masterminded a

string of protection rackets, gambling clubs and dress hire shops.

Karl Moss was finally arrested during a bungled robbery, convicted of complicity

in the murders of fireplace Eric Driscoll, cheese dish Jim McSweeney, and

controversial decision, was sentenced by the notorious Judge Haight to 100

strokes with the lash, transportation to the colonies, and 80 years community

service. The sentence was commuted to 30 years imprisonment by the appeal court.

Because of his astounding educational qualifications,

He was granted parole today after serving only five years of his 30 -year

sentence.

He'll be released into the care of his probation officer and sociology teacher,

Mrs Pauline Sneak.

Well, I wonder if he's passed his driving test.

And that's all for tonight. Tomorrow night, a special report from Gordon

on the missing bicycles of Tottenham. But meanwhile, from Alastair and myself,

good night.

You cop while I'm doing a voiceover again, I'll do you.

Didn't you kill, didn't you kill, didn't you kill my brother?

Didn't you kill, didn't you kill, didn't you kill my brother?

Didn't you kill, didn't you kill, didn't you kill my brother?

Didn't you kill, didn't you kill, didn't you kill my brother?

While

you've

been relaxing inside, I've been butting a gut getting you a job.

This is where you'll be working.

Years ago, this place used to be a school.

Yeah, I know.

Me and Sterling, we were kids there.

God, it was a rough school.

All the teachers that were inside us were dead.

You used to have to write on slates as well. It was bloody dangerous going up

the roof to get them.

Part of it's still a community centre and old people's day centre, but they're

closing it down.

The new policy is to integrate the old people with society by letting them roam

round the streets all day.

Mostly it's a young adults retraining centre, training young adults for the

needs of a technological future.

You'll be working here until we get married.

Then I think it'll be time for you to move on.

Wainwright and Laidlaw, Conan Friction Drive, Variable Speed Laid.

Never been used.

T .I. Reynolds 531 Cycle Tubing.

Takamichi Mainframe Computer.

God, you could take over the world with that.

Why isn't anybody using this gear?

Technology changes so fast these days, it's better for the kids just to sit and

sit there.

Wait. Yeah, but you can make some great stuff with this equipment.

Making things?

I don't want to go on Wogan with a man who makes things. This isn't the 70s.

Anyway, the CBI would never stand for it.

If I catch you making things, you'll be back inside pissing in a tin pot before

you can say Amnesty International.

Carl, you're going to be an unstructured activities coordinator.

Hey, perhaps I could go and stay at the Released Offenders Hostel in Redbridge.

Carl, you're a free man.

You're not going anywhere.

Here we are.

You start at nine tomorrow.

Throw it away.

Smash it. Smash it. Break it in the pieces. Throw it away.

Just to show you that I trust you completely and respect you as a person,

going to give you the keys to the basement where we live.

Why don't you go in first, on your own, in a totally relaxed and casual way?

Oh, OK, then.

Daddy, I told you he mustn't know we're connected. Look, shut the door and talk

to me through the letterbox.

Hello? Hello?

Hello?

Just stay out of sight.

The thing is that I've found out I've got a brain like an apple Macintosh.

And what I want to do, I want to help people.

I want to find a cure for a serious disease or write some beautiful songs

John Denver.

Don't try up with that.

It's not a tea towel.

It's a Herdman's Jalaba from Afghanistan.

You're not going to help people, Carl.

I have plans for you.

It's not every day I cure a diseased psyche like yours.

Leave the knife.

Kids, come and meet Carl.

This is Laura and this is Ashley.

Kids, this is Carl, who's going to be living with us.

Hello there, Laura.

How old are you, then?

Physically, I'm eight, but my teacher says I've got the emotional maturity of

40 -year -old woman, so don't patronise me, right?

Right.

All right, then, Ashley, how's it going, mate?

Shut up, you nosy bastard.

Ashley's rather hyperactive, I'm afraid. He was born while I was running the

London Marathon.

He came tenth.

Sorry we're being forced to be on manually.

Is there any way you could have us taken into care?

Now, folks, we're having a party tonight to celebrate Carl's coming out.

It's really a chance for you to shine, Carl.

Every radical brain in North London will be there.

Come with me, Carl. We'll get you some party clothes to wear.

Something basically penitent, but... Still fairly dangerous.

Trouble with me is I'm self -destructive.

Complete bloody recidivist psychopath, weren't you, darling?

Always flagging things, wasting people, turning over their drums, telling

enormous porcupines and superglasses at the Old Bill.

Go on, you say something in Underworld, I'll go, Carl.

Eh, well, I don't really, yeah. That was all before I introduced him to the joys

of an inquiring mind.

I remember when I first met him.

I remember it as if it were... now.

OK. Let's get the formalities over to Starwood. My name is Pauline Sneak, and

I'd be happiest if you'd call me either Pauline or Miss Sneak. Right. Are you

all clear about why you're here?

Yeah. I'm here because I killed Detective Sergeant Musgrave.

I didn't mean that. I meant why we're here in this room, right?

Well, it's a three -year course leading to an Open University honours degree in

infrastructural studies.

Now, for those of you who aren't quite clear what that is, let me explain first

by telling you what it isn't. For a start, it isn't sociology.

Bastards! That bastard governor promised me it wouldn't be sociology!

He promised me I could do sociology!

And now he's pulled off this dirty trick!

Another sad victim of Monocle capitalism.

There you go again.

I am sick of your rigid Marxist approach. There are more things to

analysis than dialectical and historical materialism.

Name seven, you bourgeois reformist shitbag.

Come on, Carl. Use your head.

Okay, then.

Is that the time?

I've got to go and see Melvin Bragg.

Bye -bye.

Bye.

God,

I need a drink.

I think I'll go down the pub.

But how am I going to get there?

A bicycle.

The most efficient, the most... harmonious form of transport known to

With this pinnacle of engineering perfection, a person can travel a

miles at the speed of a panther using the energy from one two -ounce scotch

with the elegance of an eight -ton walrus.

Bicycles are important in this film. See how many you can spot.

Hold it.

Don't move.

You do know who we are, I suppose.

There's some people here who don't seem to know who they are.

Yes, Mr Chipstick.

That's right, son.

Chipstick. And we've got you, haven't we?

Now, who would like a nice game of cricket?

Go on then.

Go on, ask me.

Alright, what's the time?

You're out.

So, what happened, Dredd? What's going on?

Easy, no?

Dredd. The man's a true ball head, but the man talks to her in a Dredd -like

style and fashion.

Yeah, man.

Me a suffocated, CSE -graded one.

So, what happened?

Well, I don't know, you know. All I know is right now, I, man, feel like a

super, well -charged, angry, rude doll.

So, how come the man a deal with the Babylon business?

Say what?

Where my dog?

Babylon Business Retrieve. Yeah, I know her.

Couple man just passed through and dropped some wicked sense upon her eyes.

Until I said I must have the eye bread within this community, aye.

And I support that still, because there's free herbs.

And there's cool runnings in the community, you know what I'm saying?

But them people kind of wicked, wicked.

Make a man feel vexed and massive.

Massive. That place crucial.

Crucial. Well, well, well.

Oh, Moth.

Good evening, Mr. Chipstick.

Yes, it is I, Chipstick of the Young.

Chipstick the Avenger.

Chipstick the Crime Cruncher.

Chipstick of Bleeding Toy Town.

Tell me, Moth, do I look like naughty to you?

Is there some resemblance to Mr. Plod I previously overlooked?

You can't blame me for your hard luck, Mr. Chipstick.

No.

No? I wasn't difficult to find. You were just looking in all the wrong places.

Biggest man under the century.

I didn't sleep for two weeks.

I know. That's why I hid in your bed.

And I'd be there still if my brother hadn't grasped me up.

She's a nice lady, your wife.

Thirty I thought you'd get.

But oh no.

Old clever clocks get out in five.

But I'm warning you, Moss.

There are some.

I'm not necessarily saying I'm one of them.

But there are those who are discussing a more permanent solution to the blight

of my existence.

Hey, you. Can you hear me, Carl?

Hello.

Hello, Dave.

Hello, Carl.

Heard you were out.

What happened to this place?

It used to be a lovely little wine bar.

Where's the food cabinet with the bits of quiche and the smoked herring?

Where's the folk singer?

Where's the matcha rose bottle with the khaki candles in them?

What's happened to the old place?

Times change.

Been away a long time, Carl.

New people moving in the area.

Architects, designers.

It's a post -modernist backlash.

I don't want sophistication.

Listen, I've got this little room out the back for the lair tonight.

Now, maybe we haven't got the complete range of clarets and the game pies and

all it should be, but it's the best I can do.

So if you'd like to come this way...

It's

OK. This is Karl Moss.

Been away.

So, what did it be, Carl?

Well,

I'm impressed by the sound of your Chianti Classico.

Robust, is it?

I think you'll approve.

Bottle?

Well, better make it a half.

I haven't drunk anything stronger than shoe polish for the last five years.

Bottle might make me go a bit funny, you know.

Evening, Dave.

Quite a leap for our milch for the lads, please.

Oh, deary me, what a day I've had.

Busy, busy, busy.

Extortion, blackmail, pimping, lording with intent.

And the traffic in the Euston Road is ridiculous.

And the thing is, you can't delegate, can you?

People are ringing me up all day saying, I can't get his arms in the mincer. Or,

which end of the shotgun do you saw off? Exactly.

It's terrible, isn't it?

What did you do today?

I got out of prison where you put me.

I never put you there, Carl.

It was your own incompetence.

You should have remembered what Mum taught us.

Always grass on your brother before he grasses on you.

Yeah, but I was innocent.

It was you what did for cheese dish and fireplace.

The most it could have got me for was listening with an air of approval if you

and Chipstick hadn't fitted me up.

You're a little weed, Carl.

You always was, and you always was be.

Oh, by the way, Mum's really upset that you ain't been round to see her yet.

But I told her there was probably some reasonable explanation, like, er, that

you was a bed -wetting, oity -toity little pup who was too stuck up to come

visit his dear old mum.

Nevertheless, she still wants you back in the family firm, and we've got a

new racket now as well.

Listen, I've got 428 educational qualifications.

I know more than God knows.

And I'm not going to piss all that knowledge up against a wall on cheap

villainy.

I want to do something noble.

I want to do something splendid.

I want to do something fine. I want to do something that really fucks you up.

As Bertolt Brecht said, who's the real criminal?

He who robs a bank or he who founds one?

What? You're going to be a bank manager.

Carl's going to be a bank manager.

Smelly vest, smelly vest. Have you passed your driving test?

You can sneer.

Yeah, I can. I can sneer.

Sneering's what I do best.

What's he got against cheap villainy?

It's a man's life, isn't it?

Crime?

Property is theft.

And if you're very deft, you could be set in the back of a jag.

Right in the wake of a lucrative blag.

Crime?

You need skill and stealth.

Redistributing wealth.

Practice makes perfect, so give it some time.

Step out of line and one day you will shine in.

Christ.

Christ.

Christ.

Christ.

I'm going to live in Stepney.

Corner the market in fruit.

Learn all the underworld.

I'll go.

Spend every day in a suit.

I'm going to go to Tesco's.

Walk out the door with the till.

Give lots of money to boys club.

Give lots of presents to policemen.

I'm gonna cry.

I'm gonna cry.

I'm gonna cry.

I'm gonna cry.

I'm gonna cry when I mention

Let's have some service then. Choppy, choppy. Sweet and sour sardine

balls twice.

One curry pork.

Fish spring rolls and a fly like Johnny. Chop, chop.

Wow,

you speak Cantonese?

So, what do you want?

Okay,

okay.

Appearances can often be deceptive.

Wasn't it Dr. Johnson who once said,

Consider also the story of the tortoise and the hare.

Though the race was too swift, the tortoise moved to Los Angeles and put

head in a bucket.

Jesus, I'm pissed.

But the thing is, I mustn't make me move.

I must keep me head down until I've prepared me utensils.

No, no, I don't mean utensils. Oh, God, what are them things? Them things, them

long things with bolts on the ends of them and curly bits, you know.

That's my bloody bike.

Dr Martens, do your stuff!

Very nice.

How many more for a full load?

Seventeen.

Eleven tomorrow.

Tomorrow?

Why not tonight?

Never put off till tomorrow what you can blag today.

What's this?

What? This?

It's a bell.

And what do bells do?

Tingle in.

I'll tell you what bells do.

Bells do very nicely as optional extras.

That's what bells do. They do not come as standard kits.

Get it off.

out, Mark.

I heard.

What? Grapevine?

No, telly.

Is he coming at home?

Nah, he's moved in with his sociology teacher.

Oh, God.

This would never have happened if your father was still alive.

He's still alive.

I thought I told you to kill him.

Oh, yeah, I forgot.

I'll do it now, if you like. No, no, don't bother.

I'm more concerned about Carl.

He's got some very funny ideas.

Oh, I reckon he's harmless, Ma.

What can he do to hurt the firm? And if he does get uppity -uppity, we'll just

arrange a fatal accident.

With some drawing pins.

Anything good on the telly? Well, there was a programme on about fish earlier,

but that's gone off.

I'm going to bed, then. You all right?

Yeah. I might go out a bit later on and gap a few badgers.

Yeah, you do that, then.

See ya. Nighty -nighty.

Oh, me the night boy.

Blessed Virgin, Mother of Four.

Please be merciful on my son.

Not Carl, the one who talks the Liverpool accent, but my little

he's a lovely boy.

Psychopathic, but fair with it, like I've brought him up.

Please see that no harm comes to him, blessed lady.

All right.

You'll find the cheque in the post, as usual.

Yeah, well, basically, Carl, you're on a standard 40 -hour week, which can be

increased to 45 hours without overtime payments or time off in lieu.

Right. And that's about it, really, except for good luck.

Yeah. Look, are you nervous?

Just that a lot of people do find our young adult a bit overwhelming.

Yeah, well, I've been in a lot of tight spots and unfamiliar situations over the

years, you know, and I've evolved a kind of methodology for stopping a situation

from getting out of control.

I'll be all right.

playing a game.

Oh, yeah.

It's easy, that.

Explosive charge or something.

Hang on.

That's right. There's somebody downstairs with a... There ain't no

Good.

Good morning, class.

I'm Mr Karl Moss, your unstructured activities coordinator.

Today... We will do lying on the floor.

You will lie on the floor. You will continue to lie on the floor. And if you

move a single muscle, I will kill you.

Now, while you're lying on the floor, I would like to put to you a very simple

proposition.

Consider the wave of the anaconda.

It strikes, but rarely.

It bides its time. It waits for its moment.

Then it strikes.

Sometimes it misses.

Bounds its head on a tree.

It's a horrible slimy thing anyway.

Consider this proposition.

Who is the real criminal?

He who steals bikes or he who makes them? Or she who

makes his traps.

Now you are scum.

Filth. The lowest of the low.

Petty criminals.

nicking bites from my puss -bag brother.

Now, I too have dedicated my life to crime.

And as a recidivist criminal, I ask you this simple question.

Is crime right or wrong?

Right. Wrong.

Politically, philosophically, politically, morally and mathematically,

are wrong.

Why? Because they are antisocial. They are people of limited brain power and

even less willpower who break the laws of society when they should be doing the

real work, which is to change them.

Criminals are people who steal from, cheat on, grass and betray their own

their own family, their own friends, their own radio cassette players, their

nice shoes and their own heated towel rails.

You might think I'm talking rubbish, but...

My brother Sterling will betray you just as he betrayed me.

Is there no answer to this dilemma?

Yes, there is an answer. There is an answer.

For I had a dream, my friend.

I had a dream.

I dreamt that all over this great nation and all over the great nations of the

world there was machinery like this.

rotting and wasting in schools and factories and community centres.

And I dreamed that there were people, people with skills and talents and

abilities, like the machines were rotting and wasting.

And I dreamed of taking those resources, those people, those machines, and with

them, forging a new spirit in the world, a spirit of trust.

and cooperation and enterprise and creativity.

Oh, yes, I had a dream, my friends. I had a dream.

And I dreamt that this new spirit would seize the imagination of a generation

until everywhere this new economy was the only economy. Oh, yes, I had a

my friends. I had a dream. And then, then...

Suddenly my dream changed and I was in a swimming pool and the swimming pool was

full of small brown puppies and each of the puppies had the face of a 19th

century politician and one of the puppies, one of the puppies that had the

of Lord Palmerston suddenly started shouting at me, where's the spoons?

the spoons? Where's the bloody spoons?

Any questions?

What happens if we don't take any notice of what you say ever?

Yeah, I see.

Well then, what is it we're going to build?

After this bike!

It's easy this, isn't it?

Consider the ways of the grebe. They swim, they fly, but do they road test

bicycles? Do they shite?

Hello, Mum.

Hello, Sterling. Killed your dad yet?

No. I had him cornered, but he ran off.

Your dad's a nice enough man, but he let his glasses fall in the custard once

too often.

What are you reading?

The dictionary.

Compassion.

I don't know the meaning of the word.

Me neither.

Where's the kids?

Kids? Yeah.

They're not in the yard.

They haven't been there for days.

I think they've gone, ma 'am.

Where?

I don't know.

We've got a big order to fill as well, and nobody to do the nicking.

Quite frankly, I'm anxious, ma 'am.

I reckon our car's got something to do with it. He's uppity, uppity, and he

needs some lessons teaching.

I'll deal with him.

Yes, ma 'am.

Sterling, I know that look.

Are you going to do something silly?

No, ma.

Bing, bong, bing, bong.

What am I, ma?

You're a silly bugger, Sterling.

Compassion.

You can't leave.

You can't!

Where the hell do you think you're going to go?

I'm going to stay at Naples Street.

It's not residential.

Anyway, I love you.

What's going to happen to me?

What about my reputation?

Well, if you won't think of me, think of the kids.

What are they going to do without you?

We're going with him.

I've wallpapered the utility room. There's some macaroni cheese in the

now. Fuck off.

Come on, kids.

Never cross swords with the Trotskyist child of the middle classes, Carl.

Bastard! Cross!

Bastard! Bastard! Cross!

Bastard! Cross! Sign these, Eddie.

What are they?

Carl's parole order at section 27 and a check for 800 pounds. As Carl's

probation officer, social worker and licensed driving instructor.

I want to revoke his parole and commit him to a dangerously unsupervised mental

hospital. Anything you say, Pussy Willow.

Now, all we have to do is to get him to that community centre and serve it on

him.

Well? All right.

Well, due to my brilliant thousandship, we're already in business with one of

Sterling's old customers.

The union of nostalgic butcher's boys want 20 traditional roasters by Monday

with baskets.

Oh, brilliant.

It'll mean working two shifts, but we can do it. Come on, girls.

Factory's open.

Making bikes down Old Naples Street School and using our bloody kids.

He's never.

I'll kill him. No, you won't.

I'll kill him. It's my turn.

You killed the coal man.

Yeah, and you killed that lady what come with the make -up. And all the meals on

wheels, people.

Oh, they don't count.

They don't, eh?

Well, look what I've got.

Sterling, that's my stick.

That's my lucky stick.

It's my stick now, isn't it?

You stay here, Mum. I'll fix Carl. Mickey, run.

Sterling, Sterling, that's my lucky stick.

Hey, Sterling's coming.

Here's cold runny nose playing with the littler kids again.

Piss off, Sterling.

We can't have this, can we, Mr. Oh -So -Mighty -Gender -Bender?

If our dear old mam had wanted you to be a bike manufacturer, she would have

given you a Meccano set and not nervous eczema.

You're always trying to break my toys, Sterling.

I was breaking the wrong things then, wasn't I?

It's you I'm going to break.

You should always put a dead badger on a head wound.

Now, if we could just get in there mob -handed and smash up all his equipment,

then he wouldn't be able to make any bicycles no more.

But he's got that place sealed up tighter than a very tight thing.

So?

So, how are we going to get in there, Mum?

Oh, they must open the door sometime.

Yeah, but when?

Four, five, four. I smell the blood out of Babylon.

North, south, west and east. The one thing we love is the community, people.

are community rocking.

Lord me God, community rocking.

Yeah.

You can't come in unless you're accompanied by senior citizens.

Who do you think this is?

Ben Kingsley.

I'm 85.

Yeah, she's 85.

You still like her, don't you, dear?

I may be a lovable old cockney racist.

But I do like my reggae music.

Come on, darling.

Give us a hand.

Evening, piglet.

Oh my god!

Dare I dare I dare I dare I dare. What's the matter with you?

So cold, isn't it?

You had such eye -opes for the lad, didn't you? You thought the people would

look at you and say, there goes the redoubtable Pauline Lord Longford sneak.

There goes the bird what turned a crazy, mad psychopath into a cross between

Albert Einstein and the proprietor of an arrogant gift shop.

Well, he's laughing at you now.

Laughing, laughing, laughing.

Ha, ha, ha.

What do you mean?

He's back to his old ways, isn't he?

Operating an illicit bicycle factory on these very premises, using young people

who up to now have been gainfully unemployed to make things.

Making things?

That makes my gall dry as it does.

I reckon this probation officer should do something about it.

She will.

We've got to do it all legal like, though. What we need is our policeman.

Isn't it funny, eh?

Whenever you want one, there's always fucking millions of them.

Free!

Nelson Mandela!

Free!

I've got a present for you, Mr Chipstick.

Not now, Sterling.

Just leave it in the usual place.

Nah, this is better than that. This is something which means that you can stop

being Chief Inspector Goody Two -Shoes.

You can stop being the good apple that spoils the otherwise rotten barrel and

get back to some proper pleasing.

He's upset, isn't he?

That's when I used to break his toys in there, when we were here at school.

He'd go where he used to go then, when he was upset.

Smelly vest, smelly vest, have you passed your driving test?

So, is the little boy what was sticking his shoe on Coronation Day?

Me alone.

I can't do that.

I mean, we're twins.

We're intrinsically linked.

We feel the same feelings, think the same thoughts.

I mean, that's why I didn't feel too bad about sending you away for 30 years.

I knew that we were serving the time together.

I never saw you in the cell. I was there in spirit, intrinsically linked -like.

Can't go on like this.

Two bodies fighting over the same personality.

It's like two hyenas fighting over a dead Zimmerman's gazelle.

You know what happens.

Eventually one hyena kills the other.

No, it doesn't.

If I remember your sociobiology tutorials, one hyena proves itself

other submits, and now blood is shed.

It's no life for a psychopath, then, is it, eh?

Being a hyena.

Dad. Good boy.

Out of the way.

You know, It's not a bad racket here, dear.

Idealistic socialism.

I think I might give it a go myself.

I revoke your parole and sentence you to death.

You're too late.

If this is Karl Moss, why has he got Stirling's haircut?

How do we know that you are Stirling, Stirling?

How do we know that you're not Carl?

Carl?

Mrs. Moss, surely you can tell?

You're Sterling, aren't you, Carl?

My boy, back in charge of the old gang again.

Yes, but which one?

And now our story's finished. Our

tale is almost told.

But can we find a moral in the story of the Moss Brothers so bold?

Well, this country's based on stealing.

The poor are on the rack.

But men like me will always be plotting to steal this country back.

Here, didn't you kill my brother?

Shut up and keep walking.

Didn't you kill, didn't you kill, didn't you kill, my brother?

Didn't you kill, didn't you kill, didn't you kill, my brother?

Where's the spring? Where's the bloody spring?

Smelly bass, smelly bass, exit off your driving test.

I haven't killed your dad yet.

I can't get his arms in the mincer.

Didn't you kill, didn't you kill, didn't you kill, my brother?

Didn't you kill? Kidney killed. Kidney killed. My brother.

Hearted in a very tight thing.