A really brutal film about bullying, tribal behaviour, and the rise of a horrid nationalism in defiance of and as an adjunct to the Thatcher ideology – this is rather like the subtext of Harry Potter, only for real, and you couldn’t see the fans of the wizard confectionery queuing for this darkly naturalistic scenario. What we see is uncompromisingly achieved in a story of a skinhead gang’s conflicting loyalties and foul behaviour – and I’m not just talking of the racism, nationalism, and violence. The young actor, Thomas Turgoose, who plays the lead, Shaun, was around 14 at the time of filming and it’s scary just how good he is in front of a camera. The performance the director, Shane Meadows, coaxes from him is amazing – from being bullied to being accepted to being enlightened. And what is also amazing is what we see him witnessing and what we see him doing.
The plot is simple and character-led. A young boy grieves for his father, one of the young men killed in the Falklands campaign. At school he is picked on. A chance encounter with a group of skins in an underpass leads to an uneasy but growing sense of belonging within his newfound tribe. But the tribe is itself put to the test when its no-nonsense, apparently liberal, and sympathetic leader is ousted by a bullying obsessive newly released from prison – another amazing performance from Stephen Graham as the deeply conflicted and dangerous Combo – keen to stamp his mark on the gang.
There are few coming-of-age films that are so stark, and I was taken back to two vividly resonating starting points for this brilliant film. One: memories of footage of the Falklands War that I witnessed as a 13-year-old schoolboy, just like the protagonist here. A particular image of a wounded soldier being carried past in the background on a stretcher, his leg blown off almost to the hip and the remaining bone and flesh flapping as he goes stuck with me for many years, and resurfaces here in the opening montage to shocking effect (if the gasps from other audience members were anything to go by). Two: the discovery of Jarman’s punk films in my later teens – films like ‘Jubilee’ and ‘Last of England’ with apparently ungroomed performances from Toyah Wilcox and Tilda Swinton. Here, Meadows’s editing and sequences of slow-mo montage belie the artlessness of some of his film’s raw power. The savvy camera work and the full-on performances work together to create a confrontational work of art. The sound track is a perfect fit for the songs of the era. The characters are given full delivery and development and everybody has a true moment of discovery in front of the camera, from minor gang member, Pukey’s, moment of realization, wonderfully written on the face of Jack O’Connell when he sees that standing up to Combo for what he thinks is right is only going to lead to a beating, to the pain on Stephen Graham’s face when his sexual advances are rejected. Anybody who likes Jarman or Mike Leigh or Ken Loach will want to see Meadows’s movie and ponder whether a similar talent has arrived in British film-making.
The plot is simple and character-led. A young boy grieves for his father, one of the young men killed in the Falklands campaign. At school he is picked on. A chance encounter with a group of skins in an underpass leads to an uneasy but growing sense of belonging within his newfound tribe. But the tribe is itself put to the test when its no-nonsense, apparently liberal, and sympathetic leader is ousted by a bullying obsessive newly released from prison – another amazing performance from Stephen Graham as the deeply conflicted and dangerous Combo – keen to stamp his mark on the gang.
There are few coming-of-age films that are so stark, and I was taken back to two vividly resonating starting points for this brilliant film. One: memories of footage of the Falklands War that I witnessed as a 13-year-old schoolboy, just like the protagonist here. A particular image of a wounded soldier being carried past in the background on a stretcher, his leg blown off almost to the hip and the remaining bone and flesh flapping as he goes stuck with me for many years, and resurfaces here in the opening montage to shocking effect (if the gasps from other audience members were anything to go by). Two: the discovery of Jarman’s punk films in my later teens – films like ‘Jubilee’ and ‘Last of England’ with apparently ungroomed performances from Toyah Wilcox and Tilda Swinton. Here, Meadows’s editing and sequences of slow-mo montage belie the artlessness of some of his film’s raw power. The savvy camera work and the full-on performances work together to create a confrontational work of art. The sound track is a perfect fit for the songs of the era. The characters are given full delivery and development and everybody has a true moment of discovery in front of the camera, from minor gang member, Pukey’s, moment of realization, wonderfully written on the face of Jack O’Connell when he sees that standing up to Combo for what he thinks is right is only going to lead to a beating, to the pain on Stephen Graham’s face when his sexual advances are rejected. Anybody who likes Jarman or Mike Leigh or Ken Loach will want to see Meadows’s movie and ponder whether a similar talent has arrived in British film-making.