My Beautiful Laundrette (1985)
Country: GB
Technical: col 97m
Director: Stephen Frears
Cast: Saeed Jaffrey, Roshan Seth, Daniel Day-Lewis
Synopsis:
To prove himself to his successful capitalist father a young Indian in Britain takes on a launderette and turns it into a cool place to hang out, together with his gay skinhead boyfriend.
Review:
A milestone in a number of ways: it was on the cusp of a new way of funding British cinema, with the emergence of Film Four, and later BBC Films; it effectively provided a critique of Thatcherism while playing lip service to it, what with its progressive socio-sexual politics; it burned the face of Day-Lewis onto our screens in the first of a string of striking, and strikingly different, performances. Aside from that it is dramatically cogent, with scenes kept short and cinematic, and achieves a tone both comic and serious at one with its satiric intent. The sort-of sequel, Sammy and Rosie Get Laid, took the satire too far and forgot the importance of character.
Country: GB
Technical: col 97m
Director: Stephen Frears
Cast: Saeed Jaffrey, Roshan Seth, Daniel Day-Lewis
Synopsis:
To prove himself to his successful capitalist father a young Indian in Britain takes on a launderette and turns it into a cool place to hang out, together with his gay skinhead boyfriend.
Review:
A milestone in a number of ways: it was on the cusp of a new way of funding British cinema, with the emergence of Film Four, and later BBC Films; it effectively provided a critique of Thatcherism while playing lip service to it, what with its progressive socio-sexual politics; it burned the face of Day-Lewis onto our screens in the first of a string of striking, and strikingly different, performances. Aside from that it is dramatically cogent, with scenes kept short and cinematic, and achieves a tone both comic and serious at one with its satiric intent. The sort-of sequel, Sammy and Rosie Get Laid, took the satire too far and forgot the importance of character.
Country: GB
Technical: col 97m
Director: Stephen Frears
Cast: Saeed Jaffrey, Roshan Seth, Daniel Day-Lewis
Synopsis:
To prove himself to his successful capitalist father a young Indian in Britain takes on a launderette and turns it into a cool place to hang out, together with his gay skinhead boyfriend.
Review:
A milestone in a number of ways: it was on the cusp of a new way of funding British cinema, with the emergence of Film Four, and later BBC Films; it effectively provided a critique of Thatcherism while playing lip service to it, what with its progressive socio-sexual politics; it burned the face of Day-Lewis onto our screens in the first of a string of striking, and strikingly different, performances. Aside from that it is dramatically cogent, with scenes kept short and cinematic, and achieves a tone both comic and serious at one with its satiric intent. The sort-of sequel, Sammy and Rosie Get Laid, took the satire too far and forgot the importance of character.