Shane Meadows Tagged Articles at Cinematical

By next year, it'll be four years since Shane Meadows' This is England came out and stood out as a well-observed portrait of growing up of '80s-era England, so it seems fitting that any follow-up would also take place four years after the fact. According to Screen Daily, that's just the idea, as Meadows prepares to do a four-part series called "We Were Faces" for the UK's Channel Four which will chronicle the characters as their lives have progressed by 1986.

I haven't had the chance yet to see this summer's Somers Town, the latest from Meadows and young star Thomas Turgoose, but the latter has certainly made an impression for himself between England and Eden Lake. Between that one and Somers Town, he took home the London Film Critics' Young British Performer of the Year award, so he must be doing something right, and there's a unique pleasure in seeing a young talent grow up and grow out in their work.

No offense, Freddie Highmore, but it's just not the same. Maybe you should ring up Mr. Meadows for a part...

(Thanks to IFC's Alison Willmore for the heads-up.)

My pick of the week is the emotionally charged yet evenhanded documentary Your Mommy Kills Animals -- look for a separate review later today -- but it's a wonderfully packed week for indie releases. Arthouse fans of all stripes should have a field day with Criterion's edition of Rainer Werner Fassbinder's magnificent Berlin Alexanderplatz, originally aired on German television and now restored and available on DVD for the first time.

If you missed La Vie en Rose in theaters, now's the time to catch up with the "superb performance given by Marion Cotillard," in the words of our own Erik Davis. Erik had some reservations about the film as a whole, as did Jeffrey M. Anderson, who called it "a spectacular one-woman show, but not really a movie." The DVD includes a "making of" feature. The anthology Paris, Je T'aime should be ideal for consumption on DVD: 18 short films in 120 minutes. Cinematical's Ryan Stewart felt that only "about 40 of its 120 minutes is worth saving," but his was a minority opinion. The DVD includes a "making of" documentary.

Speaking of minority opinions, I found Argentine youth drama Glue to be acutely irritating, but most reviewers recommended it. The DVD includes deleted scenes for those who can't get enough. On the other hand, I thought French girls' school fable Innocence was visually beautiful yet devoid of any substance. Again, others were better attuned to its wavelength. The DVD includes interviews with the director and an 'explanation' by one of the actresses.

Ensemble drama Resilience (pictured) drew mixed critical response but may be just right if you're looking for more "challenging material," in the words of Variety. Shane Meadows' This is England "derives its power from a pair of extraordinary performances," according to Martha Fischer. And Amazing Grace features a strong cast in the true story of British antislavery pioneer William Wilberforce.

Set against the backdrop of the Falklands war, This is England gives us the story of a young boy whose seemingly normal coming-of-age is warped by two events: the death of his father in Thatcher's arguably meaningless Argentinian conflict, and the boy's unexpected embrace by a gaggle of youngish right-wingers who are alarmed by the presence of Pakistanis in their traditionally white neighborhoods. 11-year old Shaun (played by an exceptionally good young actor named Thomas Turgoose) is a boy who seemingly, even at his young, understands the value of finding normalcy and happiness and everyday life, and the process by which he's seduced into the skinhead circle is as layered and complex as it would be for a 20-year old character, let alone one who is young enough to be barely aware of sex. Shaun is hard to impress, in other words, and is not above telling anyone who treats him like a little boy to 'piss off' or worse. One of the funny things about this intimate little drama is that its cursing would make Scorsese blush.

The leader of the skinheads is Combo (Stephen Graham), a mercurial chap who alternates between speechifying about British pride like Ed Norton in American History X and trying to make honest efforts at connecting with his co-malcontents. He's far from the most pitiless brownshirt ever portrayed in the movies, but he does possesses mean reservoirs that the movie holds back from showing us for as long as it can. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to guess how he feels about the group's one Afro-Caribbean member, called Milky. His presence in the group isn't explained very well, but I suspect the idea is that director Shane Meadows is trying to make some kind of comment on the cross-pollination of skinhead culture and punk culture that existed in lower-middle class Britain at the time. One was perhaps marginally more accepting of a Milky, while the other was decidedly not, but an outsider might be hard-pressed to sort that difference immediately. Andrew Shim plays Milky as a guy who isn't surprised to face occasional racism, but plays past it.

Some bits before the weekend:

• So much for that whole story about Ken Burns buckling to pressure and re-editing his latest documentary, The War, as I alerted you to yesterday. Right after reports were released that the film would be edited, a PBS official said that he will not be re-cutting the WWII doc. Who knows how much we can trust any of this back and forth, but as of now, there will still be extra footage, but it will not be seamlessly integrated. According to PBS -- "To the viewer at home, it will be part of the same contiguous experience" with "the same tone and tenor and production qualities" of the long film.
• Yesterday, Jette Kernion let us know that Shane Meadows' This is England had been picked up by IFC and Red Envelope. Today, Twitch has linked to the movie's trailer, and if Martha Fischer's TIFF review wasn't enough to pique your interest, this trailer should be. The film looks flipping great, and the fact that it is based on Meadow's own life, as well as that of his young star, Thomas Turgoose, makes it irresistible in that car crash sort of way.
  
• A year and a half ago, Cinematical posted that Terry Gilliam was trying to get back his script to The Man Who Killed Don Quixote. According to Gilliam: "There was kind of a legal situation where the insurance company and French production company put up a lot of money, but it looks as though things are loosening up." Things weren't as loose as he thought, and all these months later, he still doesn't have it. However, while being interviewed at the Amsterdam Fantastic Film Festival, Gilliam says that he's in "final, final, final stages of getting the script back." Once he does, he will talk to Johnny Depp and "find out if and when he's available." Will it happen? I won't hold my breath. "Loosening up" took over a year, so I have no idea how long "final, final, final" is! [via FilmIck]
  

It's always good news to see independent films gain distribution deals for theatrical or DVD release that will give them a wider audience than the film-festival circuit. Here are a couple of the latest distribution deals negotiated for smaller indie films:

• I saw the documentary 51 Birch Street at SXSW in 2006 and enjoyed it very much; it's a fascinating look at the way families do (or do not) communicate and the secrets that might be harbored. Last fall, the documentary toured theaters as part of Landmark's Truly Indie distribution program. Now director Doug Block has announced that Image Entertainment will be releasing the movie on DVD, with a tentative release date of August 14. I'm pleased that I now can recommend the film to all of you and you'll have a chance to see it in the next few months.
• IFC and Red Envelope (the theatrical distribution arm of Netflix) have bought North American distribution rights to the drama This is England (pictured above), which Martha Fischer reviewed during its premiere at Toronto International Film Festival last year and called "impressively accomplished." It's written and directed by Shane Meadows and is based on his childhood experiences. The film will be screening soon at the Tribeca Film Festival, then will be released in July as part of IFC's day-and-date program, First Take.

During the final scene of Shane Meadows' This Is England, I heard someone in the audience let out a violent, wrenching sob. The scene itself is actually quite lovely -- a young boy is standing in a field of green sea grass next to a rowboat, long-ago stranded by the tide; he's holding the St. George's Cross, the flag of England -- but it's infused with an almost inconceivable suffering and pain. Like most of Meadows' impressively accomplished film, the closing combines lush beauty -- the colors and compositions are often breathtaking -- with an incredible emotional punch, breaking our hearts with the inevitable tragedy of what we're seeing on screen.

Originally based on his own childhood, Meadows' screenplay underwent a metamorphosis after he met Thomas Turgoose, his young star. Combining his own childhood experiences with what Turgoose was going through nearly a quarter-century later, he revised his script and ended up with a heartfelt, tragic story of a boy desperate to belong. Set in the England of 1983, the movie is centered on Shaun, a 12-year-old boy whose father was recently killed in the Falkland Islands War. His pain over the loss of his dad is distancing him from his well-intentioned mother, and he doesn't fit in with the kids at school, all of whom are divided into distinct camps of fashion and ideology. Clad in bell-bottomed corduroys and a knitted sweater decorated with what look like squirrels, Shaun sticks out like a sore thumb. His inner agony gives him a hair trigger, and his explosive reactions immediately make him a target for the bullies at school -- they know they'll get a response, so they can hardly wait to wind him up.