It’s A Lot is best described as Kidulthood and Adulthood meets Ferris Bueller’s Day off and Risky Business. Although it has the gritty urban setting of its predecessors, It’s A Lot is a comedy that focuses on the mishaps and mischief of college life for a group of young British kids.
British street culture the phrase ‘It’s a lot’ is an expression used when a series of events are perceived to be too strenuous. Our here Shaun comes from a wealthy, black middle-class family with both parents in good jobs, but he has some identity issues. He struggles to accept his wraith and battles for street credibility, wanting to be like the popular top boys in college, who all drive cars and get all the girls.
Hi is a mischievous young man who will do anything to get what he wants. His parents Sandra and Michael believe that Shaun is enrolled into a three A Level course at a Fee-Paying College, however, Shaun has dropped out of college and enrolled himself on a music technology National Diploma at a local East London College. His mission is to fit into the environment and be accepted by the girl of his dreams Chrissy, who is the most popular girl in the college.
He gets his big opportunity to impress Chrissy when his parents decide to go on holiday and leave his sleepy but mouthy Grandmother to look after him and his 14-year old nuisance of a brother Tyrone. Shaun decides to borrow their Bentley to impress his dream girl. His ploy works. She is all over him like a rash as soon as she sees the car. In their brief period together Shaun agrees to let her throw a party at his parent’s mansion.
As he drops her back to her estate, he crashes the Bentley. He now has to think of a way to fix the car. Shaun turns to his cousin Kai and his friends, Stephen and Sam to come up with a solution to fix the car. They all decide on starting a fake charity. The charity, which pretends to raise aid and awareness about leukaemia, becomes an overnight success. His headteacher, newspapers, magazines and radio stations laud Shaun for his charitable efforts.
At Chrissy’s house party, Shaun rudely discovers that Chrissy is not the girl of his dreams after all. He is destined to be with the understated yet beautiful Natalie. Natalie opens up to Shaun and informs him that she loves his charity and everything he stands for because her sister is a leukaemia sufferer, who needs a bone marrow transplant. This pierces Shaun as he realizes the magnitude of his fraudulent charity.
At his lowest point, Shaun decides to confine in his next-door neighbour Mr Patel, who tells him to do the right thing and own up to his wrongdoing. Natalie and his head teacher are so excited by their charity fundraiser football match that they don’t give him a chance to own up to his wrongdoing, even when he attempts to be honest. Chrissy is bitter that she is no longer the centre of attention and as soon as she finds out about Shaun’s fraud, she spills the beans to Natalie. At this point, Mr Patel again intercedes for Shaun and gives him another opportunity to save the day. He decides to give all the money he has raised from the charity to Natalie so that her sister can go to America to get a bone-marrow transplant. However, Stephen, who is in debt to the college bullies, James and Jahvon has pilfered all the money.
With the help of his head teacher and his friends, Shaun saves the day. He signs up to the real charity to do some voluntary work. He even decides to stand up to his dad, who has neglected his sister (a single parent mum of five) who lives in squalor. In the midst of running around trying to save the day he forgets his parent’s Bentley at the mechanics!
Duration: 1h 38min