"In Harry Brown, young British people are portrayed as nothing more than enemies to be defeated. They are no different from the monsters, aliens or enemy troops in any other action film. Discuss with close reference to examples from the film."

The portrayal of British youth within Harry Brown is extremely negative and displays to the public that young individuals in society are in fact “monsters”.

The opening sequence of the film alone is very powerful in displaying the monstrous and criminal behaviours of British youth as two teenage boys aimlessly ride around shooting a gun in broad daylight and murder a mother walking her baby, with no justification other than entertainment and no guilt, other than worry of being caught. Therefore, from the very beginning, the audience feel a sense of hatred towards the young people that are shown due to the way that the media is representing them.

Another sequence within the film that portrays British youth as “enemy troops” is when the character Marky shows Harry the video of Len being killed by his friends and him. When we, the audience watch the video and see the sickening ways that the boys torture the old man by beating him to death, again gives a horrific representation of British youth.

Furthermore, towards the end of the film when the "battle" between the teenagers and police is taking place, the actions and language used by the teenagers is appaling and disrespectful. We see them smashing windows, setting fire to things, physically and verbally abusing police officers and people in authority, vandalising people's homes and so on. This influences how the media portray British youth and reason that they do in fact need to be defeated to protect society. 

Throughout the entire film, there is only one main point where justification to the behaviour of the young individuals is given to the audience. This is when it is revealed that Marky has experienced sexual abuse throughout his life and then later on in the film, it in fact shows him being sexually abused and having to perform a sexual act unwillingly. Although this makes the audience empathise with the character and almost relate to why he behaves the way he does, this is only shown for a short period of time and is not a leading part of the storyline. Therefore, despite little justification, the portrayal of British youth is still extremely negative.

Overall, representation of British youth in the media, and specifically in Harry Brown is extremely negative and they are portrayed in such a way that can only be described as monstrous.