|
 |
|
All or Nothing
*1/2
Cinema Releases - October 18, 2002
Rated on a 4-star scale. Certificate 18. UK.
128 minutes. Written and directed by Mike Leigh. Starring Timothy Spall,
Lesley Manville, Alison Garland, James Corden, Ruth Sheen, Marion Bailey,
Paul Jesson, Kathryn Hunter, Sally Hawkins, Helen Coker.
"Fuck off!"
So everyone seems to be saying in "All or
Nothing". Kids scream it at each other, and at their parents. The
parents scream it at each other just the same, and to random people, and
random noises, and it's just not very creative, is it?
Mike Leigh's film, which follows a group of families
living in the same block of London flats, is, essentially, a rehash of the
ambience from other Mike Leigh films. Every moaning piece of dialogue, every
elegiac strain of string music, every cut between different groups of performers
and every little comic icebreaker seems to come from a programmed procession.
Normally I can sit back and allow Leigh films to draw me in through their
natural curiosity about human nature. In "All or Nothing", I was guessing
lines under my breath before the players spoke them.
Leigh's filmmaking technique is usually to come
up with a basic narrative framework, give his actors a little background
on their characters and let everyone improvise the dialogue and rhythm of
scenes during rehearsals. I simply do not believe that happened with this
project, unless the entire cast and crew were watching so much of Leigh's
back catalogue that they got disconnected with any other kind of
reality.
"All or Nothing" stars Timothy Spall as an
unsuccessful taxi driver named Phil, another of his big lug characters that
slouch around with tired face and puppy-dog eyes, meaning well but never
quite managing to make those around them happy. His longtime companion is
Penny (Lesley Manville), who works at Safeway and plods through life with
expressions suggesting weariness of her children and resentment of her man.
The kids in the family are Rory (James Corden), a layabout with a chip on
his shoulder, who is responsible for many of the F-words, and Rachel (Alison
Garland), who is a shy, quiet hospital cleaner with nothing to define
herself.
Phil is a colleague of Ron (Paul Jesson), who
lives a couple of flats away with his crazy alcoholic wife Carol (Marion
Bailey) and a teenage temptress daughter named Samantha (Sally Hawkins).
Also down the hall is Penny's workmate Maureen (Ruth Sheen), the only character
in the movie who seems to have grown comfortable with life. She isn't even
bothered by her caustic daughter Donna (Helen Coker), who uses almost as
many F-words as Rory, and, like Jane Horrocks in Leigh's "Life is Sweet"
or Claire Rushbrook in "Secrets & Lies", is a short-tempered, mousy-haired
twentysomething, dividing her time between screwing her loser boyfriend and
sitting around waiting for him.
Nothing much happens in terms of plot, not even
to reveal the layers of the characters. The screenplay delights in dropping
mentions of fish and chips, goin' down the pub and being tired from work,
and there is a pathetic scene in which Spall goes around his house collecting
change from the family, so he can go to his boss at the end of the week and
pretend that he has made more money than he actually has. Leigh's films are
known for identifying with working-class Brits in a style of comic and dramatic
ease, but there's a desperation about this one, like it's clawing for some
sense of how the proles go about their business.
As if dutifully following the commandments of
bad melodrama, the movie's fat kid has a heart attack and its snappy girl
turns out to be pregnant (in a story thread that not only goes unresolved,
but hardly gets mentioned after a couple of emphatic scenes). The film's
ending finally sees Spall say what's on his mind -- he's tired of his life,
and he can't stand having the feeling that his woman no longer respects him.
It's a powerful speech, but two hours is too long to wait for a probing of
such shallow depths. We learn not a thing by the conclusion that we could
not have guessed in the opening ten minutes.
I missed the opportunity to see "All or Nothing"
at Sheffield's UGC last Friday, where the evening screening was followed
by a question-and-answer session with Leigh. I was annoyed at the time, but
perhaps my lack of attendance was a stroke of good fortune. There is nothing
I would have wanted to say to the filmmaker, who I normally respect and admire,
except to ask why his new release is so lazy, miserable and smug. This is
one of the biggest disappointments of the year.
COPYRIGHT©
2002 Ian Waldron-Mantgani
2002 Reviews
(alphabetical)
2002 Reviews (by star
rating)
Archive of all cinema reviews
(alphabetical)
Review Archive
Index
UK
Critic main page
|
|
![[Image]](http://www.ukcritic.com/posbanr2.gif)