Review of Shane Meadows’ ‘Somers Town’

Hot on the heels of his award winning This Is England, Shane Meadows returns once more to his familiar themes of outsiders and their search for love and belonging with Somers Town. A Shane Meadows film can be a thrilling experience; Dead Man’s Shoes, A Room For Romeo Brass, Once Upon A Time In The Midlands, not to mention the glorious This Is England; all beautiful, sad, exciting, hilarious gems of film.

Somers Town, though, sits a little uncomfortably in this list. The experience was slightly embarrassing, like catching somebody not quite dressed. The film was originally commissioned as a short, but Meadows decided to make it longer (although, at just over one hour running time, it hardly qualifies as a full-length film); which would have been fine, except that, oops! he forgot to add any more plot to fill in the extra time. It’s kind of like seeing someone’s sketch book, seeing a work-in-progress, rather than a finished film.

Thomas Turgoose (the adorable little tyke from This Is England), now a slightly less adorable teenager, is a charming lead, but his lack of acting experience starts to show badly when called upon to do something other than deliver a funny line.

Nevertheless, there’s a lot to like: the film is beautifully, if bleakly, shot in black and white (apart from the ridiculously sugary fantasy ending); both Turgoose and Ireneusz Czop, as the two misfit lads who find friendship and a good-natured rivalry for the affections of an unattainable French waitress, are likeable and funny; and there’s enough grimness to keep it from slipping totally into sentimentality. It’s just that you will, no doubt, leave the art house cinema thinking, ‘Is that it?’