London has a distinct Off-Off-Broadway feel. There's a stagebound quality to its handful of claustrophobic locations, its endless assault of intense coke talk, and its third-rate invocation of David Mamet, David Rabe, and Neil LaBute.

The film delivers lots of high-pitched hysteria but never manages to make its spoiled protagonists interesting.

Perhaps the best compliment that can be paid to Hunter Richards' directorial debut is that it nearly manages to make some of the most irritatingly shallow human beings on Earth seem tragic.

First-time writer-director Hunter Richards? London is even worse torture than it sounds. It includes flashbacks that actually demonstrate just how miserable a jerk the main character is.

At least London nails the inanity of drug-speak - the bathroom chat quickly devolves from God and ''time horizons'' to coprophilia and a truly dumb confessional tirade by Statham - although perhaps this achievement is unintentional.

Syd's (Chris Evans) emotional tailspin is embarrassingly banal, and his assertion that "everybody here hates me" quickly applies to the audience as well.

Bad movie. Ugly movie.

Newbie director Richards shoots all the women like slabs of meat, and his self-seriousness throughout London--some of it tries to be funny, a lot of it is funny by accident--borders on the delusional.

Syd is a jerk whose anger does not make him interesting. The only reason to keep watching is because you hope someone will drop a piano on his head.

If London were a comedy, it just might work. Instead, it's a dead-serious marathon of angst from cool kids old enough to know they're mouthing cliches.

There's absolutely nothing fantastic or transporting about London, an endlessly ponderous relationship picture that also has zilch to do with the British city.

A misfired attempt at provocation and the exploration of philosophical thought, London is little more than an immature display of male bonding on speed.

For those who enjoy fashion-model-looking twentysomethings yelling at each other in bathrooms while doing too much cocaine, voila! Heaven is a place called London.

The awful crank comedy "Spun" (2002) still ranks as the most dehumanizing youth picture of the decade, but this New York drama by first-time director Hunter Richards is a close second.