This might be Mike Leighs best film. It’s certainly one of the best i’ve seen.
Probably cus David Thewlis as disaffected Manc loser-loner “Johnny” is so spot on.
He carries you right into the heart of the hurt of his woundedness.
With such a caustic sense of futile frightening no-hope. It’s uncomfortable to watch. And yet compelling.
The dark bitter brilliant sarcasm cuts close to the edge of the bone
“There was this little dot right, and the dot went bang! and the bang expanded, energy formed into matter, matter cooled, matter lived…into the amoeba the fish, the fish the fowl, the fowl the froggy, the froggy the mammal, the mammal the monkey, the monkey the man….and quid pro quo, momento mori, add infinitum, sprinkle on a little bit of grated cheese – and leave under the grill till Doomsday“
Johnny keeps the clever pitter of patter coming, he’s read loads of books, he’s got (so he says) an A level in Psychology… a degree in Bullshit (“She’s got this irritating proclivity for negation; she thinks its progressive”)…and a Ph’d in Utterly Futile Bollocks…. he’s an incendiary device of detonated damage…..
“Do you think you might have already had the happiest moment in your whole fuckin life, and all you’ve got to look forward to is sickness and purgatory?” he’s asking his ex Louise.
Yes, a right cheery soul is Johnny.
He’s read his Book of Revelation. The Apocalypse is upon us, the End is nigh
““God doesn’t love you, God despises ya – there’s no hope. Good exists in order to be fucked up by Evil. The very existence of Good enables Evil to flourish. Therefore God is a nasty bastard”
The Pathos of the human condition is reduced to Noel Gallagher like soundbite Bathos
“You can’t make a omelette without crackin a few eggs, and humanity is just a cracked egg, and the omelette – stinks”
“We’re not fuckin important. We’re a crap idea” (chips in Liam Gallagher. Or maybe its Paul Scholes)
He wanders around the Streets of London trashing all the lonely people (where do they all come from?) All as lonely and lost as he is. He can’t even give a boozed up middle-aged woman the fuck she wants (actually, she probably wanted affection, warm human contact) “I can’t love, you look like me mutha! The look of pitiful despair on her face is matched by his look of pitying dismay (or maybe it’s disgust)
“You don’t wanna fuck me – you’ll catch something cruel” he says to her. And he’s right, he is cruel. Like God, he’s a right nasty bastard. And yet. You can’t help but feel compassion for how humanly flawed with fucked upness he is. (Whereas Greg Crudwell’s – as Jeremy G Smart – nasty bastardness is lizard-like cold and sadistic)
Katrin Cartlidge as pothead Goth Sophie and Lesley Sharp as dumpy Louise come across as mysgonised victims. “What is a proper relationship? Living with someone who talks to you after they’ve bonked ya” says Louise in her weary-woe flat Lancastrian monotone. There’s some nasty violence towards Sophie (she gets brutally sodomised/raped by psychopath Jeremy G Smart) Johnny also gets a good kicking. Twice.
Towards the end he goes through a writhing mental breakdown on the hall landing, regressing to the poor sad little unloved boy he underneath always is (maybe thats why i feel so much sympathy for him)
He does a runner. Hobbles off down the street to God knows where. To Anywhere. To Nowhere.
He’s probably never gonna find anywhere that feels like home, that feels like love.
Dir: Mike Leigh, England
8.5/10
Katrin Cartlidge died in 2002. She was only 41.
