Jason Statham is best known for hard man roles in Guy Ritchie crime thrillers, but he is proud to portray a homeless ex-soldier who becomes an avenging angel in his latest film.
Hummingbird is the conclusion of a trilogy of films about the underbelly of London life, written by Steven Knight. It follows 2002’s Dirty Pretty Things, about illegal immigrants and starring Chiwetel Ejiofor and Audrey Tautou, and Russian gangster movie Eastern Promises, with Viggo Mortensen, which was released in 2007.
To research the film, made on location and at Three Mills Studios in the East End, Statham and Knight met servicemen and other people who were homeless, and the doctors who treat them. Statham, 45, said he was very proud of playing “this totally unselfish character” in a world where “the homeless live with constant danger”.
Knight, a creator of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?, is making his directorial debut with Hummingbird and hopes to highlight the “shocking” numbers of former soldiers who end up homeless or in prison after the traumas they endure in service.
