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This is a somewhat standard biker flick, concentrating on a Western Australian bikie gang, the Copperheads. Their president, Knuck, is just getting out of prison. His vice president, Paddo, is trying to make a deal with rival gangs to save the life of his damaged drug addicted brother. And behind both their wives and girlfriends are positioning themselves for control. But Knuck’s time in prison has changed him and made him paranoid, and soon the tension between the two men will boil over.

Alas, this suffers from a bit of fatal miscasting, as Ryan Corr, playing Paddo, never really convinces as a hard-core criminal type (even the dialogue eventually agrees, with Knuck calling him “a male model in leathers”). He’s not particularly compelling as a centre for the film – everyone around him seems far more interesting and far better motivated – not just reacting to circumstances but driving them, for good or ill. Matt Nable who wrote the script has given himself the prime role of Knuck and he relishes everything the role offers – a truly toxic figure whose own internally suppressed divisions play out across the whole gang – and the script is aware of the latent homoeroticism of this mostly male environment and uses it to interesting effect. And while the setup is a bit ropey, the payoffs when they come still work pretty strongly (although the final twist seems awfully arbitrary). This isn’t perfect pulp but it has its moments of success.