Criminals are a cute and cuddly bunch, aren’t they? If they’re not pinching your wallet in an adorable fashion, they’re usually bludgeoning your head in.

That’s why we’ve compiled a list of our favourite charmers of the criminal underworld. Partly because we love you so much, partly because it ties in nicely with the release of Fatbelly: Chopper…Unchopped, a documentary about Mark ‘Chopper’ Read, available from August 2 on DVD.

Enough with the shameless advertising, you say? You’re here to read about the most Dick Dastardly delinquents of the criminal underworld; the type of moustache twirling charmers that manage to pinch a penny by sheer bravado. Well you’re in luck… after the jump.

Name: Mark ‘Chopper’ Read

Crimes: Assault, robbery, battery.

Charm Factor:

Hates bad manners and always says excuse me, please and thank you – even when handing out the occasional bashing. Claimed never to interfere with women, old people, children or the working man – Chopper saved his ire for hardened criminals – how considerate. Eric Bana played the nefarious nutter in the quite awesome movie, Chopper.

Name: Reginald and Ronald Kray

Crimes: Armed robbery, torture, arson, murder.

Charm Factor:

East End gangsters who were notorious for their violent tendencies, but famous for being big ol’ mummy’s boys. They shot several of their friends’ in the foot and were more imposing that Phil Mitchell’s reflective fuming forehead. They also hung around with some top entertainers, including Diana Dors, Frank Sinatra and Judy Garland – all their feet remained intact, thankfully.

Name: Robin Hood

Crimes: Robbery, assault.

Charm Factor: Stole from the rich and gave to the poor. Even has a proposed tax on big banks named after him! Depending on where you source your information from, he enjoyed wearing tights, was adept at using the longbow, was a talking fox and occasionally slipped into nonsensical accents in an overblown Hollywood movie. The real legend, however, was of a kindly American, who came to England with Morgan Freeman and inflicted an awful Bryan Adams song on his kingdom for generations.

Name: Charles Bronson

Crimes: Armed robbery, GBH, False imprisonment.

Charm Factor: Prone to a cup of tea and a great lover of poetry and art, Bronson was originally banged-up for seven years but his charm has had his sentence extended. Bronson holds six world records for feats of strength and fitness and well as an unofficial record for the most prison rooftop protests by any UK inmate. He also got married behind bars to one lucky fan – see kids, dreams can come true.

Name: Bugsy Siegel

Crimes: Murder, gambling, extortion.

Charm Factor: Smooth enough to convince hardened gangsters to build a gambling Mecca in the middle of the desert. Viva Las Vegas! Having murdered a good few goons in his time, he took to Las Vegas to start a new empire. He probably would’ve lived happily ever after if he wasn’t shot to death while reading the paper – just imagine the Daily Mail’s ironic headline the next day.

Name: Frank Abagnale Jr.

Crimes: Forgery, fraud.

Charm Factor: The inspiration for Leonardo DiCaprio movie Catch me If You Can, the teenage Abagnale Jr. was famously driven to commit the countless acts of fraud and forgery by his love of women. After being caught he told his father: “It’s the girls dad, they do funny things to me. I can’t explain it.” They do funny things to us too, Frank. Namely telling us to go away or they’ll call the police. Frank impersonated a Doctor, Lawyer and a Pilot in his teens, making him one hell of a smooth operator, eventually winning him his freedom by helping the FBI – crime does pay!

Name: Howard Marks

Crimes: Drug smuggling – at the height of his career he was reportedly in control of 10% of the world’s hashish trade.

Charm Factor: Oxford graduate with the moniker Mr Nice has to be doing something right… Claims not to have used violence and refused to deal with hard drugs. A former teacher, he managed to become famous as a notorious drug smuggler through connections with MI6, the IRA and the Mafia. He travelled the world, went to exclusive parties and was captured by the DEA. All of this and he had the unfortunate affliction of being completely Welsh.

So what have we learnt today everyone? Nothing, nothing at all. You can still go out and get a copy of Fatbelly: Chopper…Unchopped now.

Follow hecklerspray on Twitter

It was a straight battle of the heroes in this week’s weekend box office. In one corner there was Iron Man.

In the other, Robin Hood. In the other, if we’re being thorough, there’s the Amanda Seyfried character from that new film about letter-writing that looks like it’ll be a load of old bollocks. Who’ll come out on top? Why, Iron Man of course.

It goes without saying that Iron Man 2 beat both Robin Hood and Letters To Juliet at the US weekend box office this week. After all, Iron Man is a flying robot playboy who can shoot lasers out of his hands. And, you know, Robin Hood is a fat bloke with an unspecified regional accent who kills people with little bits of wood and then splodges around in some mud. And Amanda Seyfried is just annoying, obviously.

Congratulations to Iron Man 2 for seeing off Robin Hood‘s weekend box office challenge. It’s not entirely unexpected, to be fair – for its flaws, Iron Man 2 is still a typical fun summertime blockbuster, with jokes and special effects and pretty girls killing baddies with their thighs. On the other hand Robin Hood isn’t particularly fun, contains no jokes, minimal special effects and a tubby man in rubbish clothes who can’t decide if he’s supposed to be Irish or Welsh. Here’s the US weekend box office top five…

1 - Iron Man 2 (Remember to stay in your seats until the end of the credits. Not because there’s a cool extra scene at the end, but because you’ll really annoy the people who want to leave because their lives aren’t as comprehensively empty and miserable as yours) $53,000,000

2 - Robin Hood (The worst film ever made, if only because it makes you slightly nostalgic for Kevin Costner. At least he had a consistent accent) $37,100,000

3 - Letters To Juliet (We haven’t seen this yet, nor do we plan to, but if at least one letter in this film doesn’t read ‘Dear Juliet, HURRY UP AND FINISH THIS SHIT-AWFUL EXCUSE FOR A FILM YOU AWFUL WITCH’ then we’ll be terribly disappointed) $13,700,000

4 - Just Wright (A film where Queen Latifah falls in love with Common and… oh, wait, we think we know why this could only get to number four now) $8,500,000

5 - How To Train Your Dragon (Oh, just die already) $5,100,000

Follow hecklerspray on Twitter

In true Robin Hood spirit, Ridley Scott has taken £237million from various rich people to make a very poor movie.

Robin Hood? More like Rotten Hood.

Rotten acting, rotten script, rotten idea, very rotten accents.

In fact, Robin Hood is so bad, I have to confess I did something in a cinema that I have not done for a very long time. No, not that! Or that! And that’s just sick! No, I am talking about falling asleep. Yep, while Russell Crowe was busy cutting chunks out of British history, I was happily snoring away and was only awoken by some French woman angrily jabbing me in the chest with one of her Gitanes. In fact, I missed about 45 minutes, which, for all I know, could have been the most gripping three-quarters of an hour of cinema ever made.

But going on the murderous, bum-numbing 18 hours (it felt that long) I did see, I am pretty sure I did not miss anything. I even did a quick straw poll of people who managed to stay awake and the most flattering opinion was that ‘you might enjoy it if you were 10’. And that just about sums it up.

So what’s the story? Well, clearly not happy with the popular folklore surrounding the hooded man, Scott instead constructs a completely unnecessary back story, presumably with the sole intention of squeezing as much cash out of the project as possible by making a sequel almost inevitable. It begins with archer Robin Longstride (Crowe) on campaign with Richard the Lionheart in France. When King Dick is killed, Robin delivers the dead king’s crown to his brother John back in England.

But on his way back, he discovers nobleman Robert Loxley, who is dying after being betrayed by another English noble, Godfrey (Mark Strong), who is in cahoots with the French. He promises to return his sword back to Loxley’s dad (Max Von Sydow) in Nottingham, but also assumes his identity.

When he returns, England is on the brink of civil war and his widow, Lady Marian (Cate Blanchett), is having a few issues with the Sheriff of Nottingham and some local, wild orphans. She agrees to play along, mainly to protect her estate from the greedy King John, but also, presumably, because she likes a bit of rough.

Lots of preposterous battle scenes later and we end where the story usually starts: Robin Hood declared an outlaw.

What a total waste of time. With the notable exceptions of Von Sydow and Mark Addy (Friar Tuck), the acting is as wooden as Sherwood Forest, which is surprising knowing how good Blanchett and Crowe usually are. But it’s the accents which really steal the show. Blanchett does her best at a Nottingham accent, but Crowe cannot seem to make his mind up which part of the British Isles Robin Hood is actually from. In fact, he mumbles so much, I found myself relying on the French subtitles to get some sense of what he was actually saying.

All in all, Robin Hood totally misses the target.

Follow hecklerspray on Twitter

This week in cool and crud.

Folded:

• Evil bunnies from HELL! (great timewaster)
• Ultra Culture (the UK’s Funniest Film Blog)
• Prince of Persia Lego (childish and ace)
• Food porn (to die for)
• Robin Hood in better than expected extravaganza! (grrr…)

Creased:

• Nick Clegg (at what point did he turn into such a little weasel?)
• ‘Vote for change’ they said (well we’ve damn well got it now)
• Horrible cancer photos on cigarette packets (jeez, it’s almost like they don’t want us to buy the things)
• Estate agents (want to be an estate agent? Can spell your own name? You’re overqualified)
• Any kind of ‘megamix’ (this one especially)

10 – You want another reason to fear the octopus? Here you are – Geekologie

9 - Katie Prince does Bruno. No, not literally, Ugh - AmyGrindhouse

8 - Tara Reid does Playboy, possibly because God hates us all – Bestweekever

7 – Mariah Carey: ANALYSED – MyChemicalToilet

6 – Hey, Robin Hood looks exactly the same as Gladiator. Now there‘s a turn-up – Popsugar

5 - Irish politician swears like a bastard. He’s genuinely amazing – Asylum

4 - Dress like the people from The Hangover. You know, if you want to – Clothesonfilm

3 - Soup: THE ANSWERS – Shoutingatcows

2 - Ice cubes shaped like the Titanic. Genius – Domesticsluttery

1 – Forget X Factor or RATM. This should probably be Christmas number one, in fairness…

The latest from Sherwood Forest is that there is a God.

Back in September we reported that Russell Crowe was set to play both Robin Hood and the Sheriff of Nottingham in Ridley Scott’s Robin Hood. Think Lindsay Lohan in Parent Trap with facial hair and a few hundred extra pounds.

However, according to an update on the IMDB Russell Crowe is sticking to one role. He is donning a pair of spanx and is playing Robin Hood. The Sheriff of Nottingham is rumoured to be played by Matthew Macfadyen of Pride and Prejudice remake fame.

If recent physical appearance is anything to go by its hard not to imagine Crowe playing anything other than Friar Tuck. However, a man of his craft, the latest promo picture shows him slimmed down sporting a hair-do that would make Maximus proud.

Cate Blanchett has taken over from Sienna Miller, and been cast as Maid Marion. The mere presence of Blanchett in the line up makes the film all the more appealing.

Also with a nearly 20-year age difference between Miller and Crowe, no amount of stealing from the rich and giving to the poor would have condoned such sugardaddy casting.

The actors attached to the project all appear to be pretty awesome, it’s comforting to have in this kind of genre a leading man who can actually act. If you’re not a fan of Crowe, just be grateful it’s not Clive Owen (see, utter relief). Even if Scott at the helm doesn’t get your arrows soaring the writers alone make the project worth a look.

One such writer is Brian Helgeland, who wrote the screenplays for Man on Fire, Mystic River, LA Confidential, Payback and Assassins. OK, Assassins is no Mystic River, but you know you love that movie. If none of those films appeal enough to make you go and watch the film, maybe you don’t deserve to. No, seriously, if that isn’t your bag of chips, the other writers involved co-wrote Kung Fu Panda. Now, you definitely know you love that movie.

As a die hard and quote-addicted fan of Robin Hood Prince of Thieves, this latest man-(not quite)-in-tight adventure should be a welcome addition to the franchise. Despite the teething problems the stellar cast and crew may just pull off the film of 2011. One has to admit, the thought of Crowe donning a scowl and pivoting once again with a sword in hand, is an appealing one.

Are you not entertained?

[story by Gemma Addy]

You! Follow hecklerspray on Twitter!

News about Nottingham – Ridley Scott’s Robin Hood story, not the horrible East Midlands town – has been a bit all over the shop lately.

First Nottingham was going to star Russell Crowe as a good Sheriff of Nottingham who had to battle the evil Robin Hood, then it wasn’t going to be made at all, but now it’s back on – and it’s got completely weird. Apparently in the new Nottingham, Russell Crowe is going to play the Sheriff of Nottingham and Robin Hood.

Not in a good way, either. In Nottingham, Russell Crowe’s character will be both the Sheriff of Nottingham and Robin Hood – news which will be profoundly disappointing to all of us hoping that Nottingham would feature a Double Impact-style scene where two identical Russell Crowes have a kung-fu fight with telephones in the woods in 12th Century England.

Russell Crowe and Ridley Scott have something of a mutual profession mancrush on each other. They’ve previously teamed up on Gladiator, A Good Year, American Gangster, Body Of Lies – in fact, we’re mostly convinced that if Russell Crowe was more than 15 years old when Alien was made, it would have been about Russell Crowe bursting out of Russell Crowe’s chest and then getting fired out of a spaceship by a grappling hook fired by Russell Crowe.

Anyway, the next movie that Russell Crowe and Ridley Scott are teaming up on will be Nottingham, their revisionist take on the legend of Robin Hood. Nottingham was to stray from the traditional Robin Hood tale in several ways – there’d be no tights, no Bryan Adams songs and Nottingham wouldn’t be 30 minutes from Dover on horseback. But most importantly, Nottingham would be a detective movie about Russell Crowe playing a hard-bitten Sheriff of Nottingham on the trail of the evil criminal Robin Hood.

That’s the way it was supposed to be, at least. But not too long ago, Nottingham was shelved – the blame being laid on the writers strike, the possibility of an actors strike and the seasonal ugliness of forests. However, now Nottingham is back on with one small difference.

In the new version of Nottingham, the Sheriff Of Nottingham is Robin Hood, and Russell Crowe gets to play everybody, even Friar Tuck and Maid Marion. Probably. MTV reports:

The news comes straight from the helmer himself, with Scott revealing “He’s playing both!” exclusively to MTV News. While Scott held additional details close to his chest — saying they would take too long to describe — he did exclaim that Crowe’s dual roles would be “a good old clever adjustment of characters. One becomes the other. It changes.”

What could this all mean? Does the Sheriff of Nottingham take to robbing people as a way of collecting taxes for the king? Is there going to a Tyler Durden-style schizophrenic reveal near the end of the movie? Or is it going to be the Double Impact thing? Oh, let it be the Double Impact thing, Ridley. There’s a tenner in it for you if you make it the Double Impact thing.

But however Russell Crowe will play the Sheriff of Nottingham and Robin Hood, let’s just all be grateful that Nottingham is actually getting made. It’s been too long since a decent Robin Hood movie has been made – plus we hear that Jay-Z has already recorded another American Gangster-style album inspired by the movie, and we wouldn’t want the world to be deprived of surefire would-be hits like H To The Izzood, Wenches Wenches Wenches and I Got 99 Problems (And Scurvy Accounts For 97 Of Them), would we.