Movie Review - Somers Town

At the end of his movie you will just want to stand up and cheer.

Somers Town does not have the far reaching social analysis of This is England or the balletic masculinity of Dead Man’s Shoes. It has some of these qualities as you would expect being a Shane Meadows film, but more than anything Somers Town has heart, a big beating, bleeding, young and in love, scrapping and getting pissed heart.

The story details the lives of two lads Tomo (Thomas Turgoose) – a Nottingham lad fled to The Big Smoke homeless and penniless, and Marek (Piotr Jagiello), a Polish immigrant living with his hard drinking but loving father, who befriends Tomo.

Shot in monochrome, the north London of Somers Town looks as foreign to the audience as it is supposed to be to our two protagonists. Familiar landmarks loom like slate grey ghosts of the city’s past, ill at ease with the its uncertain future.

Turgoose picks up where he left off in This is England with another sterling performance displaying both the humanity and naivety required to sell a character who steals a lady’s clothes from a launderette and ends up looking like a “female golfer” when he’s forced to wear them. If there’s a funnier, more relaxed young actor in Britain today I’ve yet to see them.

Providing our two young stars with their voice, Paul Fraser’s dialogue rings true of everything in modern life - every idiom and reference is carefully thought out and honest. The scenes with Turgoose and Jagiello sparkle with all the enjoyment that comes at the start of new relationships, where everything is in the future; intriguing and undiscovered.

In scenes like Marek catching Tomo in a bout of self-abuse, the honesty and humour conveyed by both young men is as touching as anything between two lovers.

The ideals of friendship and joie de vivre in the most unlikely of circumstances are perhaps what give this great little film such an appealing air. Just like it’s hapless heroes, you want the film to do well from the moment the opening credits roll - it just feels right, and you want to go on feeling right along with it.

Review By Tom Henry