Writer and director Shane Meadows makes movies about English working-class people, often losers and eccentrics, struggling to keep their lives together in hard times. In TwentyFourSeven, the lead character is a tough loner who starts an amateur boxing club for the town's wayward youth who are squandering their time in feuds and aimless pursuits. It is a moving portrait of a compassionate man whose only goal is to make the world a better place. In Once Upon a Time in the Midlands, a band of scruffy characters try to find love amidst all kinds of squabbles and disappointments.
This Is England takes place in 1983 in a coastal town in northern England. Shaun (Thomas Turgoose) is twelve and lives with his mother Cynth (Jo Hartley); his father was killed while serving in the army in the Falklands. Shaun has a hard time at school and is always picked on by bullies. One day he happens upon a group of skinheads led by Woody (Joe Gilgun), who instinctively understands the boy's yearning for community. He decides to let Shaun become a member of the gang. Woody's girlfriend Lol (Vicky McClure) shaves off his hair, and he is fitted with a new outfit. Together the band of hooligans trash an unoccupied apartment with great glee. Shaun experiences his first French kiss with Smell (Rosamund Hanson), who tries to look like Boy George.
Things change in Woody's gang when Combo (Stephen Graham) shows up after being released from prison. He is a very angry and energetic skinhead with a deep-seated racial hatred of blacks and immigrants; he thinks these groups are despoiling England. Woody wants no part of Combo's allegiance to a neo-fascist organization called the National Front and leaves with other members of the gang. Shaun stays with Combo, who makes a point of acknowledging his feistiness and individualism. But in a succession of nasty and violent incidents, the young boy is exposed to the dark side of Combo's crusade in attacks on some Muslim boys, a Pakistani store owner, and a black member of Woody's gang.
Meadows draws out riveting performances from Thomas Turgoose and Stephen Graham. The music of Toots and the Maytals and other groups from the 80s make the soundtrack quite special. This Is England is another triumph for Meadows.
Special DVD features include audio commentaries by director Shane Meadows, producer Mark Herbert, and star Thomas Turgoose; "Behind The Scenes Making Of"; deleted scenes; and an interview with director Shane Meadows.
