film: Happy-Go-Lucky

It’s not always easy to keep a smile on your face. Especially when you work in a neighbourhood where owning a pitbull terrier is a status symbol. If you’re in need of cheering up, you could possibly consider a viewing of Happy-Go-Lucky.

It’s an award winning film from the slate of Mike Leigh, the master of improvisation and kitchen sink drama. Personally, I thought it was incredibly dull and grossly overrated. But then I am particularly grumpy.

Meet heroine Poppy (Sally Hawkins), possibly the happiest person in the world. She’s so happy in fact that you can’t help but sit in fear waiting for something terrible to happen to her throughout the whole movie. Some kind of secret tragedy has to be unveiled at some stage, right? Wrong.

Now if you’ve ever watched a Mike Leigh film before then you will know what to expect. Gritty attention to detail? Check. Natural acting based on large swathes of improvisation? Check. Stark inner city backdrop? Check. Depressing subject matter deigned to make you cut your wrists in the bath? No check.

Happy Go Lucky is constantly upbeat, courtesy of its lead character. She has already plucked a Golden Globe for the performance in this (and in others) and she admittedly pulls off the ‘aint life marvellous’ stick with energetic aplomb. But God did she, and by extension the whole movie annoy me to death. Life is not as all rosy as hugs with cosy bear, it’s hoodies with knives and idiots playing their iPods on public transport. How can you smile about all these things, even if you are Happy Go Lucky?

But leaving all this aside, the thing that truly offends me about Happy Go Lucky is the lack of a decent story, or any story at all for that matter. Watching this movie is like watching a series of scenes, that for the most part seem to have very little to do with eachother. They’re like dogs that sniff eachother’s arses, but then ramble off disinterested. I know it’s base to satisfy a begininng, middle and end, but thats just the way I am.

For the best of the rest:

Time Out:
Poppy (Sally Hawkins) is a 30-year-old Londoner with a bright outlook on life. She loves her job, she loves her friends, she loves her freedom. Mike Leigh’s new film follows her over a few weeks one spring as she learns to drive and embarks on a new romance.

The Telegraph:
Even from its opening scenes, it is clear that Happy-Go-Lucky is no ordinary Mike Leigh film. Its heroine, Poppy, is seen cycling through London, a contented smile playing on her lips. Sometimes she waves, cheerfully greeting passers-by. The sun-dappled city looks warm, inviting and optimistic. Surely some mistake?

Rolling Stone:
Get ready for Sally Hawkins, a dynamo of an actress who will have her way with you in Happy-Go-Lucky, leaving you enchanted, enraged to the point of madness and utterly dazzled. No list of the year’s best performances should be made without her. You should know right off that this is a Mike Leigh movie. It’s a cheerier piece of business than you might expect from the British provocateur behind Naked, Secrets & Lies and Vera Drake, but nonetheless a movie driven by character. Leigh, brought up in a Jewish immigrant family, has been called a poet of the working class. His scripts come out of improvisation, from what the actors come up with during rehearsals.